Nico's Quest
by Asilda
Summary: Alliance AU. Thanks to Anubis' ritual going wrong, while Sadie and Carter are off saving the world in ToF, Nico is stuck in the Duat, dodging dangers, saving Bast's skin, and most importantly, finding Sadie the perfect birthday present.
1. Chapter 1

My newest fic in the Alliance AU. Set after Escape From Camp Half-Blood, and during Rick Riordan's book _Throne of Fire_. This fic will contain spoilers for _Throne of Fire_, so if you haven't read it yet, and you don't want to be told what happens, please take this chance to stop reading.

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><p>1<p>

"Nico, wake up!"

Nico didn't want to. He was sleeping.

"Nico! Please! Wake up! _Nico, wake up!"_

It was the primal fear more than anything else that cut through the sleepy haze obscuring Nico's mind. Someone was scared. He was too out of it to be able to tell who it was yet, but he knew that he couldn't leave them like that. It wasn't in his nature to turn away when someone needed help.

"Hang on. I'll save you." He struggled to open his eyes which wasn't easy. All of his muscles seemed heavy, somehow. Almost numb. This realization alarmed him and helped him fight off the sleep haze. Something was wrong with him, he realized. He wondered if he'd been poisoned as he tried to remember where he was and what he'd been doing.

A sigh of relief was heaved by someone close by. "Thank the eternal sun. Are you awake now?"

"Anubis?" Nico recognized the voice but something about it seemed strange. _I'm hearing it with my ears,_ he realized suddenly. _Not in my head the way he usually speaks to me._

"I'm here. Can you open your eyes?"

Nico made a monumental effort and was rewarded by a face-full of stinging sharp bright light that had him squeezing his eyelids shut again. "No."

"You just did."

Nico swallowed, suddenly aware of how dry his mouth was. "What happened?" he asked. "What hit me?"

He could still feel his connection to Anubis in his mind. Nico thought he would have known instantly if that was gone, he'd grown so used to being the death god's host. But Anubis was also physically beside him which meant that they were either in a place of death, like a funeral home or public school . . . or . . .

"We're in the Duat," Anubis told him right before Nico's mind could come to that conclusion on its own. "Remember? We came here to do the locator ritual."

Translation: Nico had come there to be a tool for Anubis while he did the locator ritual.

"Did it work?" Nico tried opening his eyes again but winced against the brightness of the light once more. "Did you find the book?"

Anubis was silent.

"Argh!" Nico cried out in frustration. Then he started coughing violently. He felt as though he'd inhaled a desert. The kind that was spelled with only one 'S' and was usually associated with sand and heat-strokes. Not the kind spelled with two 'S's that were made out of sweet sugary stuff, which Nico inhaled on a regular basis.

"Are you alright?" Anubis sounded worried again.

_You stupid jackal-headed freak!_ Nico raged in his mind, sending his thoughts through their fused souls since he didn't have to physically speak to convey his message to Anubis this way._ What the crap? You dragged me on another acid trip into the Duat for nothing? You put me through all that for nothing?_

'All that' was the process that had left Nico limp and worn out, and obviously, up until just a minute ago, unconscious. As Anubus' host, Nico could serve as a conduit for the god, enabling Anubis to do things that he couldn't normally do. Unless he was acting through Nico, Anubis' powers were restricted to places of mourning while he was on earth. In the Duat he had more freedom, but there were still things that the Egyptian gods required hosts for to direct their magic properly, just as magicians required staves and wands for maximum efficiency in their spells. Had Anubis tried the locator ritual without Nico there to use as a conduit, he might have ended up blasting himself off to some far corner of the Duat which would take weeks to get back from. Nico didn't mind a little pain. Or a lot of pain. What he'd just gone through was nothing compared to some of the things that had happened to him in the past. But channeling the full force of Anubis' magic had left him so drained that it was impossible for frustration not to set in. Now he felt like crying. He had no energy, they had no idea where the Book of Ra, the one artifact that could save their world was, and the world was two weeks away from being destroyed by Apophis' next move in the chaotic chess game they were playing with him.

"No, Nico, I found the locations of the book," said Anubis just as Nico had started to give in to despair.

_What? But then . . . wait, locations? Plural?_

"Yes. I've found that the book was split into three pieces. That was why I paused before answering. The situation has grown more complicated."

_I don't see how, _ Nico sent his thoughts to Anubis while swallowing hard, trying to moisten his throat after his coughing spell ended. _You know all three locations, right? So all we have to do is cause three times as much trouble as we were planning to. That's a piece of cake for us._

Anubis laughed out loud. "I wish it were that easy." Nico felt the god grip his arms and pull him into a seated position, pressing his back against what felt like a stone wall. "Here. Drink." The canteen that Nico kept his nectar in was pressed to his lips.

Nico opened his eyes and jerkily reached up to take it from Anubis. _I don't need you treating me like an invalid._

"Isn't that what you are?" teased Anubis as Nico took a sip of nectar of his own accord.

_Says the guy who needed my power to do the ritual._

"I didn't need your power," said Anubis, correcting what he must have thought was a slip on Nico's part. "I needed your body."

Nico scowled. "When you say it like that you sound like a pervert!"

Anubis stared at him confused, with eyes that were so much like his own that Nico found it a little disturbing. Looking at Anubis was almost like looking at a mirror that showed him what he could expect to look like in three years. Anubis seemed to be thinking about what he'd said and trying to figure out what had come out wrong, then seemed to give up.

"There is another problem aside from the book being split into three pieces," said Anubis after giving up.

"No, it just thinks it's a problem, mainly because it hasn't met me yet." With the nectar starting to work, Nico was feeling better already. "Don't worry, Anubis, I'll set it straight."

Anubis smiled. "I'm glad you're feeling better. I was worried that the ritual was too much for you to handle." His smile faded. "I'm sorry. I miscalculated. The book being split into three pieces caused me to use as much . . . as much _mana_ as I would need to cast it three times."

"Because after you commit to a spell there's no going back," said Nico to prove that he had learned something from his magic lessons, during which he always frustrated Sadie, Carter, Anubis, and Bast to no end with his lack of progress and inability to stay still long enough to concentrate. He had warned them that demigods made horrible students, but they hadn't believed until trying to actually teach him. Like with most demigods, Nico's battle-wired reflexes made book learning a nightmare for him. They'd only been able to make progress after Sadie, amazed by how he'd memorized all the intricate rules and strategies of Mythomagic when he tried to teach it to her, got the idea of teaching him using terms from the game. He'd begun making noticibly more progress after that, but since he had been making almost none before, that didn't necessarily mean too much.

Anubis' face grew very sober and he clenched his jaw.

"What's wrong?" Nico asked.

"I thought that I had killed you."

_Oh._ Nico guessed right then that he must have been worse off than he'd thought before waking up. "Well . . . sorry, but you don't get to inherit my Mythomagic decks quite yet."

Anubis glared at him.

"What?"

"You shouldn't make light of the situation. That was a Great Spell, magnified three times and channeled through your body. What we did shouldn't have been possible. By all rights you should have been destroyed so completely that I shouldn't have been able to bring back even a handful of your ashes to Percy."

"By all rights I should be over eighty years old and nearing death's door on my own, without anyone's help," Nico pointed out. "And why are you of all people getting upset about this?"

"Why aren't you?" countered Anubis.

"Because it didn't happen," said Nico. "What do you want? Me to be angry at you for something completely unforeseen happening and putting me in danger? Newsflash: that happens every single time I go out to Dairy Queen. Which is why I usually stick to McDonalds now, because it's safer for some reason. I think those golden arches might be some sort of protective talisman. So what's this thing that you think is going to be a problem?"

"You're changing the subject."

Nico heaved a sigh. "Are you trying to make me angry at you?"

"I put you in mortal peril," said Anubis. "You have a right to be angry with me."

"But I'm not. So you don't need to feel guilty about this. Now can we please move on? We need to get back to the normal world and tell Sadie and Carter about the book. Then we have to go get the pieces of the book and blow some stuff up." Nico got to his feet, using the wall for support. "Two weeks until the equinox . . . so if we allot two days to finding each piece that will still give us a week to figure out how to use it and –"

"That's wrong," said Anubis.

"Fine," huffed Nico. "A week and a day to figure out how to –"

"No."

"I know how to add and subtract you know."

"Do you remember how I told you that time moves differently in some parts of the Duat, and can speed up or slow down at certain times depending on multitudes of factors?" asked Anubis.

That's when it clicked for Nico what the problem was. "How much time do we have?" he asked.

"Four days."

"Then why are we just standing here?" demanded Nico.

"You are standing here. Along with the largest part of my consciousness. Other parts of my consciousness have been working to aid Sadie and Carter and the stupid cat ever since I learned the location of the three pieces of the book, and it has not been easy." Anubis bared his teeth and looked furious for a moment. "I even had to make nice with my cousin Horus to get him to pass a message along for me, the obnoxious, loud-mouthed , would-be dictator. By now the Kanes should have one third of the book."

"Well that's good. I – oh no!" Something horrible occurred to Nico. "Oh no, no, no."

"What?" Anubis made a move as though to grab his arm but drew up short before he actually touched Nico. "Are you alright?"

_"I forgot to get Sadie something for her birthday!"_ Nico felt a wave of disgust at himself. "I can't believe I forgot! What kind of a friend am I?"

Anubis looked at him very oddly. "This gift-giving ritual on one's birthday . . . it's that important?"

"Yes!" snapped Nico. "Especially when the someone's a girl! Especially when the girl is someone you care about in any way, shape, or form! She'll think you don't care about her if you don't get her something good enough, trust me, I know. Bianca and I couldn't remember our real birthdays, so she chose one for herself, out of the blue, and since I didn't even know I couldn't get her anything, and I don't even want to remember what happened then! And Bianca was just a normal girl back then with no super powers!" Nico gripped his head in both hands. "I don't even want to think about what Sadie's going to do!"

Now Anubis was starting to look alarmed. "But . . . in your defense, you were incapacitated and stuck in a time warp."

"Trust me, that's not going to matter," Nico told him. "Gods help me."

Anubis stared at him for several seconds. Then he spoke again. "I have been waiting for an opportunity to speak with Sadie or Carter, but so far they have not passed close enough to any cemeteries."

"Just stand in the doorway of my room and yell at them or their trainees until they come," suggested Nico. "Wait, just yell at Carter. It's Sadie's birthday, you shouldn't make her mad or bad things will befall you."

"I would have done that already if I could have," said Anubis. "But we seem to have hit a snag there. It seems that while you are in the Duat I cannot access your room."

"Huh?"

"I was only ever able to claim it as my territory –"

"It's my territory, not yours."

"Because it was your room. Whether that was because you are the son of a death god or because you are my host, I do not know. But it seems that while you are in the Duat, whatever ownership rights you have over that room have been nullified," Anubis said. "I cannot enter it."

"They're not nullified, I'm not giving it up, it's my room," said Nico, glad to have something else to worry about to distract him from his problem of Sadie and her birthday. "None of those trainees better try to move in while I'm gone. I swear to Dad, if I get back and there are penguins in my room . . ."

Anubis looked like he was trying not to smile. "Getting you out of the Duat will take some time. Perhaps you will find a suitable gift along the way."

"That won't work, Anubis. I can't just be like, 'Happy birthday Sadie, here's a rock from the Duat.' I might die. Wait." Nico's eyes widened. "How long do you think it will take me to get out of here?"

"A couple days," said Anubis. "Don't worry, you'll be out before the equinox."

"But Sadie and Carter –"

"Will be okay," Anubis said. "They already have one third of the book. As soon as they come close enough to one of my territories for me to call out to them, they'll be on their way to the next piece. Once they find it . . . I'll send them to the final piece."

"What's wrong with the final piece?" Nico wanted to know.

"Nothing's wrong with the final piece."

"Then why did you pause?"

Anubis frowned at him. "I didn't."

"You did. You definitely paused."

Anubis hesitated, and Nico could tell he was about to lie. "It will be difficult for them to get to. If we can get you back to your world before they need that information then you could shadow travel them. But I don't think we'll make it in time," said the death god.

"We can try," said Nico, deciding to let the matter pass. Even if Anubis wasn't being truthful to him, he couldn't do anything about it to help Sadie and Carter where he was right now. He took a step away from the wall then wavered. Channeling all of Anubis' powers was still taking its toll on him, it seemed, and leaving him with bad balance.

Anubis started to reach for Nico but stopped when Nico gave him a glare. "Perhaps you should take more nectar or eat some ambrosia?"

"I already took as much as I should risk," Nico told him. "Anymore and I'll have increased chances of burning up."

"Well then," said Anubis. And he held out a hand toward Nico.

At first Nico thought that the god wanted him to hold his hand, and he was about to tell Anubis exactly what he could do with that offer. But then Anubis' hand began glowing with green light, and the light in his palm stretched outward, taking shape. Before Nico's eyes, it transformed into a black wooden staff, carved with hieroglyphics and symbols of death and rebirth, like ankhs, scarabs, and scales. At the top was the head of a jackal with red stones set in its eyes.

"I was going to wait until you were a little better at magic to make you a staff, but now's as good a time as ever," said Anubis. "You can use it to help you not fall on your stubborn face."

Nico took the staff. "Thanks."

"But you cannot give this to Sadie for her birthday present. The power I put in here is not compatible with hers and –"

"And if a girl finds out that you re-gifted them something the results can be even worse than if you just outright forgot," Nico cut him off. "Contrary to popular belief, I'm not suicidal, even if I do think constantly about death. Now let's go. I want to get out of here."

"Come then," said Anubis. He took the lead.

Nico followed using his new staff to help him. There was no time to waste. He had a world to save, and a birthday present for Sadie to find, and failing either task would give rise to chaos and cause copious amounts of pain.

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><p>AN: Just as a warning, chapter 2 probably won't be up until next week or the week after. I'm not abandoning the fic, nor have I been grounded again, I just have school work that requires a very large amount of time and results in very little actual learning, or in other words, projects. I just finished one where I had to build a three-foot-long cathedral out of sugar cubes. Because it was really educational. The others are just as pointless and time consuming, but there's no getting out of doing them.<p>

But about the fics: I'm still working out how to make this AU fit as close as possible to the real Kane Chronicles, because that's part of what makes writing these fics fun for me. The timeline is a little messed up, I know, but I'm not going to go back and try to fix that because I'll probably overlook some references to how many weeks or months have passed and end up confusing anyone who's just started reading it. But I do plan to fix a few things that _Throne of Fire_ proved me wrong about, like Sadie and Carter not having found any trainees in 'Escape from Camp Half-Blood'


	2. Chapter 2

2

"Didn't I have wings the last time I was here?"

"Hmm?" Anubis looked at him.

"Wings," repeated Nico. "I know I was tripping on acid, but I distinctly recall having a pair of big black wings. So why don't I have them now?"

Anubis shrugged. "Sometimes the Duat changes you more into what you need to be when you enter. At other times, you're free to remain as you are."

"What do you mean 'what I need to be'?" Nico wanted to know.

Anubis gave him a tolerant look and began to explain as they continued walking. "The Duat isn't a place like your world. Ideas go much further here, time runs different in different places, and both fate and tradition are able to influence those who enter."

"Why?"

"That's just how it is," Anubis told him.

"So what's the significance of me having wings?"

Anubis hesitated before answering. "I do not know," he then admitted. "Your wings looked similar to a vulture's –"

"And vultures are associated with death," Nico remembered.

"Not always. Not in Ancient Egypt. They were seen as protectors," said Anubis.

"Then me having vulture wings might be a good thing instead of straight-up morbid?" asked Nico hopefully.

"Perhaps." Anubis spared a rare smile for Nico. Despite everything that had happened and his guilt for nearly killing Nico with the powerful locating spell that had turned out to be three times more powerful than he'd expected it to be, Anubis was quite proud of his host. Nico had been through so much in his relatively short, time-warped, and twisted up life. More than most people ever had to deal with, and it seemed like fate just kept heaping more and more on top of him. Nico didn't just meet it head on, which would have been impressive enough on its own, he also met it with a positive attitude, something very rare for someone so closely linked with death.

"I wish I had them now," said Nico, his face lit with a dreamy, childish look. Through their link, Anubis could feel Nico's enthusiasm and excitement for whatever he was about to say. "I bet I could move so much faster if I could fly. I'd be all like _whooooosh_ and be out of here in no time," he said, pantomiming a gesture that Anubis thought was probably supposed to signify an airplane as he made the accompanying sound effect. "And I wouldn't even have to worry about Zeus smiting me, would I? He doesn't get any authority in the Duat does he?"

"No, he doesn't," confirmed Anubis. "But don't be too hasty in your wish. You wouldn't have any idea how to work your wings, would you?"

"I've flown before, remember?" responded Nico. "On Dedalus' wings. That was fun."

Anubis looked away so that Nico wouldn't see his smile grow wider. It wouldn't do to have anyone, even his host, thinking that he was going soft. But it was hard not to have a soft spot where his host was concerned. Or where his host's friend Sadie was concerned either, but the way Anubis felt about Sadie was completely different . . . and it was probably better not to dwell on that now.

But Nico . . . Nico was kind of like the little brother Anubis never had. Anubis knew it was a mistake to think about a mortal that way and tried not to, but he really couldn't help it. In the past few months he'd gotten to know Nico better than he'd ever known anyone else before, be they god, goddess, or mortal, and he couldn't help it. He liked Nico a lot. The kid was a little awkward and weird, and a little OCD as well, but he wasn't a bad kid. Anubis actually thought he was funny and . . . well . . . cute, but he was careful never to let Nico know that, lest he be on the receiving end of one of Nico's angry Italian cursing sprees. There were times that Anubis found himself wishing that Nico wasn't his host, but that Nico was a god too. It wouldn't have mattered to Anubis if Nico was on the Egyptian pantheon, or Greek one, or some other one entirely. He was pretty sure they'd have ended up being friends eventually. There were only so many immortal beings who played Mythomagic, after all. Anubis had asked every single one of them and found less than a dozen in the entire world.

It made him feel incredibly guilty that he'd nearly killed Nico with that stupid ritual. And it didn't make him feel any better that Nico didn't blame him. It had still been a lack of foresight on his part. He should have foreseen that the book might have been split up. He should have thought to include safeguards against that in his spell. He didn't even know what he would have said to Carter and Sadie if he'd killed Nico, let alone to Percy.

The thought of having to tell Percy was enough to make Anubis shudder. Gods didn't normally fear mortals, even if said mortals were sorcerers or demigods, but Percy Jackson was one that any wise god would do well to make an exception for. Anubis had learned from Nico's memories that Percy had once beaten Aries in a one-on-one fight and gone up against Kronus himself. He also knew that Percy had the curse of Achilles and therefore only one weak spot. He was also pretty sure he knew where that weak point was. Nico did his best never to think about it, knowing that Anubis had access to all of his thoughts and memories, but Nico was too smart and knew Percy too well not to have figured out the general area where Percy's weak point would be, and therefore Anubis knew too. But even with that information, it would be a mistake to underestimate Percy. Anubis hoped to never have a reason to face Percy as an enemy, and he knew that Percy also saw Nico as the little brother he never had . . . aside from that Tyson character. Well the fact remained that Nico was very important to Percy. If anyone hurt him they'd have Percy to deal with. Anubis was sure no one had forgotten what happened to that crazy Aziza woman, and the tiger fish incident.

Nico kept up a light conversation as they walked, most of it about inconsequential stuff, which was good, because Anubis was a little distracted. He kept the largest part of his consciousness there beside Nico, so that he could protect his host if something attacked, but the other fragments of his consciousness were having to work overtime as strange developments began taking place. Bast had returned to the Duat to scout out the area around her former prison, and Sadie had gotten into trouble and needed help, and with his host stuck here in the Duat, there was frustratingly little that Anubis could do to assist her. Anubis had to wait until Sadie ran past a cemetery before he was able to even talk with her, and even then all he was able to do was give her a knife and some directions. And a birthday kiss, which he wasn't able to enjoy nearly as much as he hoped he would have, due to the fact that he was concurrently talking with Bes and getting him to go pick Sadie up early, as well as noticing that Nico's strength seemed to be waning and that his eyelids were fluttering, and he was stumbling every third step.

"Let's stop for a few minutes and rest," said Anubis finally, when he was able to shift his concentration back to his host, once Sadie was on her way to the Underground, and Bes was on his way to go pick her up.

"No."

Anubis regarded his host, non-plussed. "And why not? You are clearly tired."

"Because every minute I spend here could end up being an hour or more," said Nico. His expression darkened with stubbornness. "So if I rest for five minutes here, that could be five hours in the normal world."

This was true, but it was also true that Nico needed to rest.

"Besides," Nico continued, looking around them. "This part of the Duat is pretty much a barren desert. It's kind of pointless to sit down in the middle of a sand covered wasteland. The sun here will bake me just as much as if I'd kept moving."

Anubis froze. He hadn't considered the Duat's sun and its effects on his host, but now that he was paying attention he could see that Nico wasn't having an easy time of it. His normally pale skin was flushed and his hair was slick with sweat.

"You look terrible."

Nico looked at him incredulously. "You're insulting my looks now? Really, Anubis?"

"You know what I meant." Anubis took off his jacket and handed it to Nico. "Drape this over your head."

Nico shook his head. "That will just make me hotter."

"It will shield you from some of the sun's rays. You're likely to get sun poisoning if you continue as you are."

"Sun poisoning? You mean sunburn?" Nico gave a dry laugh.

"No, I mean sun poisoning."

"Since when is the sun poisonous?" Nico wanted to know.

"I've seen enough people die from over-exposure to the sun that you should trust me about this one," said Anubis, then he sighed.

Nico reluctantly draped the jacket over his head then took a sip of nectar from his canteen. "Are we any closer to getting out of here?" he asked.

"We still have a fair ways to go," admitted Anubis.

"Okay. Are you going to tell me what else you've been doing while we've been walking?" Nico knelt down and then sat, carefully keeping Anubis' jacket angled between himself and the sun. "I can tell when you're not paying attention to what I'm saying you know. Not that I'm mad since you're probably doing something important. I just want to know what's going on."

It was a reasonable demand, and there was no reason Anubis saw not to tell him. "I managed to speak with Sadie. She was in danger –"

"Then go to her," said Nico immediately. "I'll be fine on my own. Hurry and –"

"I cannot move freely through the mortal realm, if you'll remember," Anubis reminded him. "Only in places of death, or inside of your head. And I already assisted Sadie all that I could."

Nico started to stand. Anubis nudged him with one foot, urging him to stay down.

"You should rest."

"I should get out of here and help them, that's what I should do," returned Nico.

"Sadie is no longer in immediate danger," Anubis told him. And it was true. Bes had picked up her, and Carter, and that other guy who wasn't nearly as handsome as Anubis' projection of a human body was. He had seen when they drove past a roadside memorial for someone who'd been killed in a car wreck, where their friends and family had left flowers. It counted as Anubis' territory, but barely, but it had sufficed. Sadie didn't seem to have seen him standing there by the side of the road, on top of the dying flowers as they drove by, but Bes had noticed him and nodded to him, conveying a great deal of information in a single look, as only gods could.

"What happened?" Nico asked.

"Her grandparents became possessed by two gods who are not on our side," Anubis told him.

"They went after her family?" Nico was on his feet before Anubis could stop him.

"She escaped."

"But they still have her _family?"_ Nico's eyes blazed with dark fire.

"No. The gods were exorcised. Her grandparents should be safe now."

Naked relief crossed Nico's face. The subject of families always seemed to get him quite worked up, and even though Anubis had spent several months in his head, he still didn't understand why. Yes, he knew that Nico had been deprived of his own family, but that didn't explain why he cared so much about other peoples' families. He had gone out of his way to protect Percy's mother in that last stretch during the Battle of Manhattan. And he hadn't really liked Sadie at all until learning that she'd had the chance to walk away from Carter and Egyptian magic and have a normal life, but chose to stay with her brother instead. Anubis wondered if this was one of those irrational human things that could be explained with psychology and decided to look into it, but that would have to wait until he could spare some concentration for it.

"Her grandparents may be traumatized by the experience, but at least they're alive," continued Anubis. "Sadie was picked up by Bes, the god of dwarves and a friend of Bast. They are currently on their way to Russia to find the second part of the Book of Ra. I also gave Sadie something that she will find useful once they have combined all three parts."

"I see. So are you going to tell me now what's got you worried about the third part of the book, or are you going to sit on that information a little longer too?"

Anubis started then made a face. His link with Nico didn't work exactly the way most links between the Egyptian gods and their hosts worked. Usually the gods could control what their host gleaned from them, but had free access to all their host's thoughts and memories. Somewhere along the line of accidentally fusing his soul to Nico's, the link had started working both ways. Nico couldn't consciously access most of Anubis' thoughts or memories, but on the subconscious level he'd picked up quite a bit of Anubis' knowledge which he'd started using instinctually. And while Anubis could shield his thoughts from Nico when he wanted to, and hide information that he thought it wouldn't benefit the kid to know, lying to him outright was nearly impossible. He should have known better than to hope Nico wouldn't notice earlier.

"The final part of the book is hidden in a place where I felt traces of my father's magic," confessed Anubis, deciding to be honest now. Holding out any longer wouldn't help anything, and would only agitate Nico and make him even more suspicious.

"Is it booby-trapped?" Nico asked, his eyes narrowing.

"Quite possibly. Even if it's not, that doesn't mean there aren't dangers surrounding it," Anubis told him. "In fact, it's probably more likely that there are great dangers around it if Set didn't take the time to booby-trap it."

"So . . . are you worried that it's not booby-trapped, or that it is?" Nico wondered.

"I'm worried about what my father's reaction will be when I tell Sadie and Carter where to find it," confessed Anubis. "He is the one who hid it. That much is obvious. It would be naïve of me to think he wouldn't learn that it was his son who guided his enemies there."

"Sorry," muttered Nico, looking away. "I didn't know your reasons for keeping that from me were personal."

"Don't be sorry," Anubis told him. "It's not your fault. Besides . . . I knew the time would eventually come where I had to declare my allegiances. To be honest, I doubt my father expects anything more from me. He never seemed to have high standards for me . . . or really have standards from the beginning."

He felt a flash of empathy through his link with Nico, and was grateful for it – both the empathy and the link. Nico of all people knew what it was like to have a powerful, standoffish, self-absorbed, power-hungry, and quite possibly evil father that he didn't know how to talk to. Without their telepathic connection, Nico would have been forced to rely on words to convey his sympathy and support, and Nico wasn't the greatest speaker when it came to talking about feelings.

But almost immediately, Anubis was distracted from the moment of camaraderie he was sharing with his host . . . by the annoying cat of all people. What was happening, Anubis couldn't tell. All that he could feel was a sort of general telepathic call for help. A divine SOS, or something of the sort. From the stupid cat.

"What was that?" asked Nico, looking alarmed.

Anubis looked at him sharply. "You felt that too?" he asked.

Nico nodded. "Was that . . . was that Bast? Is she calling you?"

"Yes. She sent out a distress call to every god on our side, it seems." Anubis sighed. "It would be negligent of me not to check and see what's wrong with her, but I don't like the idea of dividing my consciousness even more. Too much is happening . . . why couldn't that stupid cat just have done her job?"

"How far away is she?" asked Nico.

"You're not coming," Anubis told him.

"How far away is she?" Nico repeated.

"You are not coming," said Anubis again. "If the stupid cat got herself into trouble then she can either get herself out, or make do with help from a fragment of my consciousness."

"She wouldn't be calling for help if she could get herself out of it, would she?" demanded Nico, raising an annoyingly valid point. "And who's to say that you'll be able to help her without me there? You're stronger when you're working through me. You said it yourself."

Anubis didn't like it . . . but Nico was probably right. There was all kinds of trouble that Bast could have gotten into on her mission . . . and the general area where her mission was supposed to be was pretty close to another exit from the Duat. It was further away, but when Anubis calculated the speeds in which the areas they'd be traveling through ran, compared to the speeds of the areas he'd been planning on taking Nico through, there wouldn't be that great a difference in the amount of time it would take. It would just increase the probability of running into nasty, dangerous gods and creatures by a lot more than Anubis would have preferred, and they'd have a lot further to travel. And Anubis liked this even less, but Nico was clearly in no shape for that long a journey. Not if he had to make it on his own two feet.

"Alright. We'll go help the dumb cat," decided Anubis.

"Both of us?" Nico asked.

"Both of us," said Anubis. "On one condition."

"I'm sensing that I will not like this condition."

"Probably not. In fact, I know you won't," said Anubis. Then he shape-shifted into one of his alternate forms, and moments later stood before Nico in the form of a giant, black jackal, the size of a small horse. "If you want to come you will allow me to carry you on my back. Otherwise we'll never make it in time."

Nico looked irate at this indignity. "Are you sure you can't just tell the Duat to change me into my winged form, because that's what I need to be right now?"

"Get on already," growled Anubis.

Nico grudgingly obeyed, climbing onto Anubis' back carefully when Anubis crouched down to make it easier for him. He lay almost flat on the giant jackal's back and wrapped his arms around Anubis' neck tightly so that he wouldn't call off. Moments later they were racing across the scorching sands, on their way to help the stupid cat.

* * *

><p>Sorry this took longer to post than I thought it would. I find it incredibly difficult to write Anubis and make him sympathetic, and at the same time try to keep him in character, and I'm still not sure I succeeded on all those points. Next chapter is going to focus on Nico again because he's easier. : p It will probably be up in about two weeks since I have exams the first half of this week, then I'm going to beach week with my friends.<p> 


	3. Chapter 3

3

Some people might think that it was fun to ride a giant jackal across a vast, time-twisted nether-world desert.

Some people were morons.

And Nico could attest that there was nothing remotely fun about it. He had decided that he hated the Duat. It was a world with rules all its own, some of which only seemed to apply in certain parts of it, which made everything all the more confusing. There were plenty of mythical places from Greek mythology that were similar to certain parts, as far as rules or things like time speeding up or slowing down went, but at least those dimensions each had their own consistent rules.

Nico felt a little nauseous and more than a little disjointed as the world abruptly shifted from a desert to what seemed to be the inside of a huge pyramid, forgoing the normal stages of transition like doors and walls. The two segments of the world just kind of blurred together, so that one minute Anubis and Nico were traveling at top speed through the desert, then for ten seconds they were in this in between stage where giant stone blocks hung at random intervals in the air, along with a semi-transparent death mural and hieroglyphic display. Then the next they were loping down a long, long, long dark passageway like the kind found inside of pyramids.

"Stop!" Nico shouted suddenly and scrambled to jump off Anubis' back before the jackal-god even came to a complete stop.

"What's wrong?" demanded Anubis. He spun around to where Nico had leapt off and was leaning against the wall clutching his head. "Are you ill?"

"I thought I was going to throw up for a second," admitted Nico. "I didn't want to throw up on you. That would've sucked."

Anubis, still in jackal form, regarded him with an almost sympathetic expression, and it was testament to how messed up Nico's life was that he had no problem thinking that a jackal could look sympathetic.

"We should not linger here longer than we have to," Anubis said after Nico had taken several seconds to try to pull himself back together. "In this part of the Duat time is very compressed."

"What does that mean?"

"That time is passing very quickly in your world, and that if we spend an hour here then we may miss the equinox completely."

Nico swore in Italian. "Why didn't you tell me that sooner?" he demanded, climbing back onto Anubis' back as quickly as he could.

Anubis didn't answer, not with words, anyway. Nico could feel what he was thinking through their link though. Anubis was still worried about him and didn't want him pushing himself too hard. What had happened during the ritual must have really freaked Anubis out.

Unconsciously, Nico started to remember the event, but the memory that he ended up remembering actually wasn't his own, probably because Nico's own memory of the ritual going wrong had been washed in both adrenaline and magic to the point where it had dissolved like papyrus in vinegar. But when the images and memory came to the forefront of his mind, at first he didn't realize that they weren't his own, but Anubis'. Anubis had been inside Nico's head during the ritual, after all, using him as a conduit for the magic that was needed, so their memories of the event were parallel to begin with.

_ He'd been chanting in Egyptian as hieroglyphics appeared in the air around his host, shimmering with an unholy light that he was sure looked totally awesome. In fact, he really wished that one of the Mythomagic artists could see it, because it would have made an awesome illustration for a card._

_ And thinking of those cards, he really needed to find a way to get in contact with their creators, because he'd heard rumors that they were doing two cross-pantheon series, one themed around divine, life-giving, holier-than-thou gods and entities, and another around death gods and their ilk, and if it was true he did _not_ want his new card to end up gimp. His card stats needed some major upgrades, doubly so since he was using a son of Hades as his host, and maybe that hadn't been a deliberate choice, but there was no denying that it made him epicly badass. Hundreds of Egyptian gods had failed to do what he'd done by accident, and now that it had happened he could understand why those gods had risked starting a war with the Greek pantheon._

_ But he needed to concentrate on the spell so that he didn't end up blasting Nico and himself further into the Duat. He realized now that he shouldn't have held off so long on this ritual, after they'd discovered the cursed snake's plans. Nico was thoroughly capable of channeling the power he needed to cast this spell. If he'd done it sooner then they could have found the book sooner, and that would have given Sadie more time to read it and figure out how to use it. And it would be her who used it, Anubis knew, since hieroglyphics were her specialty._

_ The ritual was going well. Nico was doing very well, letting Anubis take control of his body, even though he knew Nico hated that. But he understood the importance of the spell and so he had given up control willingly, and was being very careful not to assert his will or do anything that would take Anubis' attention away from the task at hand as Anubis chanted in Ancient Egyptian and channeled a veritable river of power through his body, compared to the steady streams he usually sent through. _

_ Then something went wrong. Anubis felt his control over the amount of power he was channeling starting to slip, and that river turned into a raging torrent. He didn't understand what was happening at first, and tried to reign the power in, but it was no use. It was flooding through every one of Nico's veins, hammering through the stone scarab that had replaced his heart, filling his lungs and burning out through his skin, and there was nothing Anubis could do to stop it. He tried to. He tried really hard because he could see the smoke rising around Nico and he could actually smell burning, but there was nothing that could be done. He'd long ago passed the point of no return, committed to the spell, and now there would be no stopping it, and Anubis knew it, but he struggled anyway because _hedid not want Nico to die_. _

_ Nico started screaming, no longer able to keep his consciousness to the side now that he was being burned up by three times the magic power Anubis had expected to channel through him, and all of it flooding through him at once. Or maybe it was Anubis who was screaming, trying to stop the spell or redirect the magic or anything that would save his host, even though he knew nothing he did would have any effect._

_ The magic had formed a sort of twister around Nico as it leaked out of him, swirling around his slight form violently before exploding and sending tendrils out in three different directions, tendril's that parts of Anubis' consciousness were carried along on for the ride. That was when he realized what had happened, how the Book of Ra had been split into three parts, which was why the spell had ended up using three times the magic he'd thought it would. _

_ While those other pieces of his consciousness found where the three parts of the Book of Ra were hidden, Anubis used the largest part of his consciousness to will himself a physical form, right next to Nico who had collapsed onto the sand, face down._

_ "Nico!" he shouted, rolling him over onto his back. Nico's eyes were open but blank, and if Anubis' soul hadn't still been fused to Nico's, he would have thought his friend was dead. Nico looked that much like a corpse, enough to fool a death god._

_ Smoke was rising around him in small white tendrils, his hair had been singed in some places, and he was clearly unconscious, but he was alive. _

Nico flinched away from Anubis' memory with a start. He hadn't intended to snoop through Anubis' memories to begin with, and seeing himself looking so much like a corpse had just been plain weird. Thankfully Anubis didn't seem to have realized that anything was amiss with Nico, or that he'd summoned one of his memories. Or if he did realize it, he didn't say anything. He seemed to be more focused on getting them out of the time compressed segment of the Duat as fast as possible.

They reached the end of the pyramid-hall-segment when it melded with a segment that seemed to be some sort of garden. Again, there was no door, no clear line dividing the two areas. The floor gradiated from huge stone blocks into the small tiles of a garden path, and the stone blocks making up the walls started to become semi-transparent and then some hung in the air without any under them, supporting them, and there were semi-transparent palm trees and shrubs. And again Nico felt sick to his stomach.

"Stop, stop, stop!" he cried and jumped off Anubis' back before his friend came to a complete halt. He managed to land on his feet but then dropped to his knees and gagged, fighting to keep from throwing up. This time he failed and ended up losing his lunch all over some weird looking bush.

A hand on his back made him jump, but he quickly realized that it was just Anubis, in human form now.

"Sorry," Nico whispered, too embarrassed to look at his friend.

"It seems that switching from areas of differently compressed time makes you sick," said Anubis. "You do not need to apologize for that."

"Is this how Percy felt when Sadie and Carter used that all-rivers-are-one spell?" Nico wondered out loud. Now he felt a little bad about having made fun of Percy for that.

"I cannot say, but it is possible," said Anubis. He gripped Nico by his shoulders and pulled him back, away from the spot where he'd been sick, then made him sit down once he was suitably far enough away. "You should rest."

Nico shook his head. "I'm ready to go. I won't throw up on you, I promise."

"That's not what I'm worried about." There was that note of anxiety in Anubis' voice again, and Nico was reminded of his friend's actions when the spell spiraled out of control. He'd given Anubis a real scare, Nico realized, and felt a little bad about it . . . but at the same time it was kind of nice to know that he did care, even if he didn't like being fussed over.

"How compressed is time in this place?" asked Nico.

"Barely compressed at all," Anubis told him. "Time actually runs much slower here than anywhere else I know of. We could spend a week here and only a few minutes would have passed in your world."

"Wow." Good news at last. "Maybe I will rest . . . just for a few minutes."

They could afford that, right? A few minutes here would only be a few milliseconds on earth. Even if he were to fall asleep and nap for an hour (which he had no intentions of doing) that would still be less than a second. So it was okay, wasn't it?

"You're going to rest longer than a couple minutes," Anubis told him. "In fact, you're going to get some sleep. It will take us about thirty-six hours of traveling in this part of the Duat to reach the point where it junctures with the area where Bast is supposed to be. Us spending a few more hours here will not make any difference one way or the other."

Nico shook his head. "I don't want to waste any time at all."

"Don't be ridiculous, Nico."

"I don't want to be selfish," Nico said. "Everyone else is out there giving this fight their all, and I'm stuck here."

"If not for you the fight would already be lost," snapped Anubis. "We would have no idea where the Book of Ra is, let alone that it was split up into three pieces, and we would have no way of finding Ra and reviving him. You have done your part, Nico. If you insist on picking up the slack for the stupid cat then you will at least get some rest first."

Nico knew he shouldn't argue . . . even though he wanted to . . . even thought what Anubis said made perfect sense, and arguing would have been ridiculous. Part of him knew that he'd passed the point of being able to stay awake and still be sensible. He was so tired now that everything seemed like crap, and losing his lunch a few minutes ago had pushed him over that edge.

"Can . . ." Nico hesitated.

"What?" asked Anubis instead of just reading his mind, because he knew Nico didn't like it when he did that.

"Can we go a little further before I rest?" he asked and quickly added, "I want some water. My throat hurts."

Anubis nodded and helped him up. "There's a stream right over here."

Nico followed Anubis to the stream, glad that Anubis hadn't tried to pick him up, or offered to carry him because that would have been most annoying. The stream wasn't very far and when they reached it, Nico realized that it was testament to how tired he was that he hadn't heard it or noticed it earlier, because it was quite a large stream. Large enough for Nico to be completely submerged if he jumped into it, which he did, because he was so damn hot after spending so long in the desert and riding around on a freaking jackal for so long, and the water was so nice and cool.

Anubis immediately grabbed him by his arm and started to haul him out. Nico whined in protest which made Anubis pause, and Nico felt the god searching his mind, then a feeling like understanding came through their link. "I thought that you had fallen in," he explained.

Nico's graceless entrance into the water with all his clothes and boots still on probably had made it look like he'd fallen in but Nico couldn't bring himself to care. He floated on his back for a moment, then drank his fill, then held out a hand to Anubis. He felt the god search his mind again, making sure that Nico actually did want help out, and had no plans to pull him in (which hadn't even occurred to Nico, but which he would definitely remember for next time) then the god seized his hand and pulled him out of the water.

"Get some sleep," Anubis told him, guiding him over to some nearby bushes that provided some shade. "I'll keep watch."

"Thanks, Anubis," Nico told him and closed his eyes, and immediately fell into a fitful sleep.

He awoke several hours later to the sounds of violent splashing, snapping jaws, and an animalistic scream of pain, as Anubis and someone or some_thing_ else engaged in mortal combat in the stream.

* * *

><p>AN: To address some recurring questions from reviews and messages I've received:<p>

Any love between Nico and Anubis will just be brotherly love. Same goes for any love between Nico and Percy, because that's how I see their relationship (in Nico and Percy's case) or think their relationship would be like (in the case of Nico and Anubis.)

At this point I'm not sure which character Sadie will end up with in this AU, and I'm waiting to see how the canon story plays out as well as how everyone feels about it, before I decide.

I don't dislike Bast, I actually think she's pretty cool, but Anubis and Bast don't get along, and Anubis' resentment kind of seeps through to Nico who's stuck between them when they get in their cat and dog fights as it is, and he's obviously going to take Anubis' side. So the instances when Bast is referred to as stupid or annoying or any other insults are intended to be from Nico's or Anubis' POV.

I'm behind on responding to messages, but I'll get to them as quickly as I can. Lastly, KusajishiFuktaicho, I hope you like the flashback scene. I added that as per your suggestion. : )


	4. Chapter 4

Sorry I took so long to get this chappie posted. It's been a busy summer.

4

"Anubis!" Nico leapt to his feet and pulled out his switchblade. He hit the button that turned it into a three foot long sword of pure Stygian iron and hurried toward the water's edge, trying to discern what was happening. The violent splashing of the water made that difficult but as Nico got closer he was able to get a better idea what was going on.

Anubis was in his jackal form, fighting something massive. Nico couldn't get a good look at it, but he could tell that it was bigger than Anubis and in the water it seemed to have the advantage. In fact, it seemed to have latched onto the back of Anubis' neck by its teeth and was worrying at the scruff of his neck, trying to bite through deeper and reach his spine. Nico felt his blood start to boil as he launched himself into the fight.

He landed on the monster's back and immediately sunk his sword between two of its vertebrae, severing its spinal cord quite neatly. The monster made a horrible gasping noise as its hind legs went limp and it released Anubis from its grasp.

"How do you like it?" Nico growled and twisted his sword savagely. Energy began flowing through the sword as the Stygian iron drained the monster's life force. The monster gave a scream and thrashed, falling backwards, and Nico, still on its back, went under with it. Thankfully he managed to inhale before being submerged but he didn't manage to hold his ground on the monster's back. Its skin was too slippery and the facts that he was upside down, underwater, and weighed less than the monster were all against him managing to stay on. He used his fall (even though it wasn't quite a fall since he was . . . well, falling up) to his advantage, however, and held onto his sword, dragging it through the monster's belly as he made for the surface.

The water turned red, like a sea of Kool-aide, as Nico's head broke the surface of the water. Something caught the back of his jacket and Nico started to twist, ready to slice whatever was attacking him, but stopped himself when he realized that it was just Anubis. The jackal snapped its neck back and tossed Nico into the air and slightly backwards. Nico flipped and this time when he landed, it was on Anubis' back. That was good, since he would have been at a disadvantage trying to fight the monster while swimming. Even Anubis had been at a disadvantage of it in the water, before Nico severed its spine, and Nico wasn't the greatest swimmer.

"What in Dad's name is that?" Nico wanted to know.

"A minor goddess," Anubis told him. "Reret. Hold on."

Nico had just enough time to brace himself before Anubis darted in for the kill. The giant jackal's jaws snapped down on the monster's neck, severing the vital arteries and windpipe.

"Damn it, Anubis!" shouted Nico. "You stole my kill!"

"It was my kill."

_"My_ kill!"

"I saw it first!" growled the death god. Then he had to shut up for a minute as he grabbed Reret's carcass by the back of her neck and dragged her onto the shore.

"Couldn't you see I was in the process of carving my name on it?"

"I'm glad to see you're feeling better." Anubis stepped away from the corpse and knelt down so that Nico could slide off.

"So . . . you said he . . . I mean she . . . or it . . . is a goddess?" asked Nico, inspecting their defeated foe. She was some sort of hippo-crocodile-hybrid, but didn't really look anything like Ammit, who was small but fierce and cool looking. Reret seemed to be put together from the rejected parts of the two animals, sporting a crocodile's stubby legs and tail, and a hippo's bulky body. Its head was a little like a crocodile's near the eyes and neck, but it had a hippo's not-so-fierce-looking mouth. All in all . . . lame. No wonder they never made a Mythomagic card of it. Or her . . . or whatever.

"She was a goddess," said Anubis, shifting into his human form and looking down at her. His voice was a little strange. "She's dead now. Truly dead."

"What?" exclaimed Nico. Surely he couldn't have heard that right.

"We killed her," said Anubis. "Permanantly."

"But – what – how – wasn't she a goddess?" spluttered Nico. "Isn't she supposed to be immortal?"

"In time all things meet their end. She was never a very powerful goddess to begin with. Her followers were never numerous. There were at least a dozen of other hippopotamus goddesses more popular than her, and being mistaken for them or overshadowed by them for centuries would have weakened her."

"But she was strong enough to think she could take you on," said Nico. "In fact, when I woke up it looked like she had the upper hand."

"In the water," said Anubis, looking annoyed. "I went to get a drink and lowered my guard, but there is no way she could have defeated me."

He was telling the truth, Nico knew. Anubis couldn't lie to him flat out with their souls fused as they were. He would have turned the fight around on his own if Nico hadn't intervened. It just would have taken him a minute or two to throw the annoyance off of him.

"I don't think she would have died . . . except . . ." Anubis looked at Nico's sword. "She barely had any life force left to begin with. When it was drained . . ."

"It's not my fault she picked a fight with a death god and a death god's son," growled Nico. "If she was that weak and she went against us, she was asking for it! What did she attack you for anyway?"

"She sided against the Kanes."

"Stupid."

Anubis nodded. "More and more gods are declaring their sides: those who wish Ra to return, those who fight against his return, and those who side with Apophis."

"And was she one of the ones who doesn't want Ra back, or one of the ones siding with the snake?"

"With the snake. She was weak enough that she had nothing to lose."

"Except her very existence, or whatever you call a god's semblance of life," said Nico. He hesitated and attuned himself to his connection with Anubis, searching for an answer to the question that was eating at him, hoping he wouldn't have to ask it. But Anubis thoughts weren't clear to Nico at that moment, and so he had to ask. "Are you mad at me?"

Anubis looked at him with surprise. "Why would I be mad at you?"

"I . . . was partly a little bit responsible for ending her immortal life."

"I'm not mad at you." A smile tugged at the corner of Anubis' mouth and he lowered his mental guard slightly, probably unintentionally, but it let Nico get a better idea of what his friend was feeling. He was proud, Nico realized. Pleased that Nico had immediately come to his rescue, with no hesitation, even though he hadn't needed rescuing, because he wasn't used to having anyone looking out for him or being unconditionally on his side.

"Oh . . . well, good," said Nico, feeling a little embarrassed. He stood up straighter and scowled at Anubis. "Because I'm not sorry!"

Anubis chuckled and shook his head. "How are you feeling, by the way?"

"Better. Awake. Should we go? Or did you want to do something about that?" Nico looked at the corpse, just as it started to smolder and evaporate. "Or . . . never mind."

"You didn't rest very long, but you are looking better," said Anubis.

"I'm ready to go if you are," Nico told him. "I do feel better. Nothing like killing a goddess to make a death god's son feel alive."

"We have a long trek ahead of us," Anubis warned him.

"That's fine. Maybe it'll give me time to think of something to get Sadie for her birthday," said Nico. He climbed back onto Anubis's back when Anubis knelt beside him.

"I'll keep an eye out for rocks," teased Anubis.

"I already told you, I can't just give her a rock. She'll only use it to hit me in the head." Nico held on as Anubis stood and started running.

He could appreciate the sped that Anubis was capable of moving at better now that he wasn't feeling so sick and tired, and also since the sun wasn't so scorchingly hot. It was hot, but not too hot. Warm enough to chase away the constant chill that usually plagued Nico as a side effect of his powers. Both Nico and Anubis were still drenched from their fight in the water when they started off, but it didn't take them too long to dry. After that, the journey was almost . . . well, pleasant.

It was weird, and Nico would have been the first to admit it. The world was on the brink of ending. It survival depended on him and his friends, but mainly his friends now that he was stuck here, unable to help them. 'Here' was the time-bent conundrum of a dimension that he was currently stuck in, on his way to help a cat goddess, while riding a giant jackal god, who he'd accidentally fused souls with . . . and Nico was feeling pretty good about life in general. He was happy.

_Yeah,_ said Anubis in his mind, after gleaning off his thoughts. _You're definitely messed up._

_Oh shut up,_ said Nico. _Don't think I couldn't feel how happy you were to have a mere demi-god backing you up against that washed up hippo goddess_

Anubis laughed it off, or at least he tried to, but with their connection wide open, Nico could tell he was still just as touched by Nico's immediate and unconditional support as he'd been when it first happened. Oddly enough, he reminded Nico of himself in this respect. Before Percy found him, back around the time of the Battle of the Labyrinth, Nico had grown so used to being alone that he couldn't understand why Percy was so hell-bent on helping him. Especially after the way he'd acted toward Percy. It had been nice realizing there was someone there he could depend on. And Nico had needed help a lot worse than Anubis ever would. Still, he could understand why Anubis appreciated Nico's support, even if he didn't really need it. Sometimes it was just nice knowing someone had your back.

* * *

><p>They traveled for a long time. Hours. Sometimes talking, sometimes not. Anubis ran for most of the day without tiring. For Nico, it was kind of like a long boring road trip. They stopped to rest for awhile when he fell asleep and tumbled off Anubis's back. Then they started journeying again.<p>

By the time they reached the end of the that zone of the Duat, Nico was nearly out of his mind with boredom. And the truth was, even though he'd never been officially diagnosed with ADHD like most demigods in that era were, Nico had it just as bad as the rest of them. He was hardwired for battle and sitting still for so long was killing him. He was actually ready to welcome a fight for his life when Anubis skidded to a stop before the spot where the zone they were currently in merged with the one Bast had called for help from.

"This may affect you badly," warned Anubis. "In the area we are about to enter, time is nearly as compressed as it was in the area we were in before this one. On the one hand, this is good because it means not much time has passed for Bast since when she called for help. On the other hand, if the longer we stay here, the less likely we are to make it out in time to help Sadie and Carter."

Nico swallowed and tried to mentally prepare himself. "If something happens to me, like if I jump off and get sick, don't stop. Just get to Bast. I'll catch up."

"Once we get her, we're getting out of there," said Anubis. "As quickly as possible. Most likely she's overwhelmed by enemies since there aren't many gods or demons that can go one on one against Bast. As much as I hate to admit it, the cat is one of the best melee fighters in existence. If I have to plunge into the middle of a mob of demons I want you staying back. Understand?"

Nico just smirked. "We'll see."

* * *

><p>Once again, sorry about taking so long to write and post this chapter. I'll try to get the next one posted much faster.<p> 


	5. Chapter 5

5

The moment they entered the portion of the Duat where Bast was, it was easy to see why she needed help. There were demons everywhere. Every. Freaking. Where.

"Not good," Nico groaned and jumped off Anubis's back. He remembered what Anubis had told him, and he knew that Anubis probably needed to plunge straight into the middle of the fray, since that's where Bast was fighting. A course of action like that would probably take every bit of power and concentration that Anubis had, and Nico knew he'd only be in the way.

"Wait here!" Anubis ordered, and shape-shifted into his half-human, half-jackal form, growing so that he stood twelve feet tall before he raced forward and literally dove into the legion of demons surrounding Bast.

Nico covered his mouth and fought back the nausea, but was surprised when it wasn't so bad this time. He only felt sick for a couple seconds and then he was fine.

"Wait here," he muttered. "Yeah. Like that's going to happen."

He wasn't psycho enough to think plunging into a sea of Egyptian demons was a good idea, namely since he wasn't an un-killable god like Anubis and Bast were, but that didn't mean he was going to stand by and do nothing while they fought for . . . well, not their lives, but while they fought their hearts out like they were currently doing. He could at least cut down some of the demons who stood between them and the exit, help clear a path and all.

So that's what Nico did.

It worked to his advantage that all the focus was on the two gods. It meant that he could slice down his enemies from behind, and that was something Nico had absolutely no moral qualms against. Percy would have balked, he knew, but Percy was a morally better person than Nico, and Nico would be the first to admit it. That didn't mean Nico was a bad person. People like Percy needed people like Nico on their sides, Nico knew. They needed people who weren't honorable to carry out black bag ops, or drastically thin out their enemy's troops by any means necessary.

Nico cut down a dozen demons who never even realized he was there before they began to realize he was a threat. And that was when the real fun started. The demons began converging on him, like they'd enjoy nothing more than tearing him to pieces. Which was funny, because that was exactly how Nico felt about them. He felt his demigod reflexes begin to shift into overdrive, giving him a heightened sense of awareness, and with that came the incredible feeling that made him feel more alive than he could describe.

Combat.

Battle.

War.

It was what demigods were hardwired for, all of them, even the ones who claimed they wanted nothing to do with it. Sometimes, like now, Nico felt like this was the reason he was alive.

And it made him damn glad that they hadn't gotten some boring happily-ever-after when the Battle of Manhattan was finished. It made him glad there were still enemies to kill.

* * *

><p>"What have you gotten yourself into, you stupid cat?" Anubis berated Bast the moment he was close enough for her to hear.<p>

"About time, dog!" shouted Bast, right back at him. "What took you so long?"

Anubis gave her a wordless growl as he cut down demon after demon and fought his way to the cat goddess's side. "You've been waiting, what, five minutes?" he asked he was close enough to speak without having to shout over the dying wails of demons between both of them.

"More like ten!"

"You've always been a drama queen, you know?" said Anubis. "We just didn't have a word for it back at the dawn of civilization. Otherwise you'd be the patron goddess of drama queens and divas, you annoying –"

"Look out!" Bast leapt clear over Anubis to pounce on a demon who would have skewered him. In a blur of movement, she took down that demon and three others, striking so fast that even Anubis could barely track her. "Stop your whining and concentrate on fighting, you stupid mutt!"

"What do you think I'm doing?" demanded Anubis. Then he added grudgingly, "But thanks for that."

"Hmph. You owe me a can of Friskies."

"The hell I do."

"Which one?" Bast wanted to know.

"Take your pick," he told her.

"Less talking, more killing, pup," said Bast. "Unless you want your host to get a higher kill-count than you today."

"What?" Anubis looked up sharply and sought out Nico. As Bast had implied, he had joined in the battle. Or perhaps the battle had come to him. There was a sizable dent in the demon legion, as well as evidence of many demons having been dispatched. _Nico! Are you okay?_

_I'm fine,_ telepathed Nico back to him. _Is Bast okay?_

_She's annoying as ever, which means she's fine. Hang on, we'll fight our way to you and get out of here._

Nico telepathed a wordless sort of agreement then turned his attention back to his own fights. He was doing quite well, Anubis saw, sparing a fragment of his energy to give Nico a little extra, not that Nico seemed to need it. He was in his element. Kind of. Okay, his element would probably be him laying waste to an army of Greek monsters rather than Egyptian demons, but the fight and his devastating abilities remained the same. It reminded Anubis that even though it was so easy to see his host as just a lost little kid, he had hidden strengths beyond what most mortals could ever dream.

And there was something else, Anubis noticed, as he channeled a little extra power to Nico. Something had changed since the last time he'd spoken in Nico's head, which had been before he and Nico killed that rogue hippo goddess, but . . . if Anubis wasn't mistaken, there was more Egyptian power in Nico than there had been before, and not all of it was Anubis's power.

_Did sword drain her powers and give them to Nico,_ he wondered. But there was no time to dwell on it. Not now. He was up to his ears in demons too, which was saying something considering that he was currently twelve feet tall.

"Did you find out what you needed to?" he asked Bast, praying that the answer was yes, because if not, they weren't likely to find out now.

"Yeah. I just needed some help with crowd control!" Bast told him. "It's taking me too long to get past these guys, so I needed a hand if I wanted to make it out sometime this month. It's not like I was in danger or anything."

Anubis snorted.

"What? I wasn't."

"Sure you weren't."

Fighting back to back with Bast was weird, but kind of nice. It was always nice to know that one of the best melee fighters in existence had your back, even if you were there to bail her out of trouble.

"No one else answered your call?" asked Anubis as he realized he and Nico were the only other ones there on their side.

Bast made an angry yowling sound that Anubis interpreted as a no. Further conversation was put on hold as they cleaved and scratched and cut their way back toward Nico, fighting for every inch. Time was of the essence. Every minute they wasted was hours in the mortal realm and this was definitely taking much too long. In fact, trying to clear a path back had already taken about ten times as long as it had to get to Bast in the first place, and they weren't even half-way there yet.

"I'm going to say something you're not going to like," said Anubis to Bast.

"So what else is new?"

"We need to turn tail and run."

"What?" yowled Bast.

"I don't get why you haven't already! In fact, I don't think I'll ever be able to figure you out. You spent half of eternity battling that cursed snake. Why do you pretend to be a scaredy cat so often?"

"I'm not the one suggesting we run from this!" said Bast with a furiosity Anubis hadn't expected.

"What? Do you want to be here until next century? Because my host doesn't feel like doing the time warp again! Prioritize for once, and put your pride aside!"

Bast's expression darkened, and she suddenly looked like she'd just realized something. Then she nodded. "I'll go first," she said as she shape-shifted into a more feline form than she'd been using before.

Anubis used his power to clear out a ten foot radius around himself and Bast before he shifted to full jackal form and telepathed the plan to Nico.

"By the way, Anubis," said Bast as her muscles were tensing as she prepared to run. "Thanks for coming."

Then she was off before Anubis could respond in any way except to follow at her heels. They tore through the throngs of demons but didn't take the time to cut them down. They just needed to get through them. Get past them, and out of this time compressed trap before any more time passed.

Nico was ready and waiting as they raced by, to the point where Anubis didn't even have to slow down or break stride to collect his host. Nico flung out one arm like he was a trick rider as Anubis sprinted by, and grabbed hold of Anubis's jeweled and gold collar. Anubis's momentum swept him off his feet and he twisted in the air so that he could get one leg over Anubis' back.

_Nice move,_ Anubis told him.

Nico mentally beamed. _Wasn't it? Anyone watching would think we'd practiced that._

Then they were racing through the distorted area between the two different realm segments, and then Nico was coughing and choking in the most undignified manner, like he might throw up, but Anubis didn't stop.

_Do not get off. Even if you throw up, do not get off. We cannot let them catch up to us._

_ I'm holding on, _Nico told him weakly. _I actually think I'm getting the time compression sickness under better control._

It was true. Nico didn't get sick or jump off. In only seconds he'd stopped gagging and was just focused on holding on, and Anubis was able to sprint at full speed again. He and Bast kept on running for an hour, even though there were no signs of pursuit.

Finally, when Bast began to slow her steps, Anubis did as well. They both skidded to a stop next to a gently flowing stream. Nico didn't seem to have realized their drop in speed, however, and was unprepared for the sudden stop, and when it came he went catapulting off Anubis's back and landed in the stream.

Bast laughed as she shifted to her human form. Anubis held his laughter but shape-shifted back as well.

Nico stood up in the shallow water, spluttering. "You did that on purpose," he accused, but the accusation was hollow, and they both knew it. Nico had access to his thoughts. He had access to Nico's thoughts. Nico's contained no real anger or suspicion, and Anubis knew his didn't contain any malicious or mischievous intent, even though he did find the situation amusing.

"Sorry about that," said Anubis. He held out a hand to help Nico out of the water, which Nico immediately grabbed. And it occurred to Anubis that at one time Nico wouldn't have accepted a helping hand from anyone. He took it as a good sign that he was able to accept one now, and so casually at that.

"So . . . yeah," said Nico. He slicked back his hair, which had fallen all in his face when he'd been soaked. The effect made it look like he was just wearing a lot of hair gel, and gave him the look of either a young greaser or a Mafioso in training. Anubis wasn't quite sure which. "That was a good fight," continued Nico. "Too bad it was in that time compressed place or we could've stayed longer and maybe killed them all. My score was twenty-nine. What did you guys get?"

Anubis and Bast traded looks and shrugged. "I didn't count," admitted Anubis.

"Neither did I, but I'm pretty sure I had you beat, small fry," Bast told him.

"Yeah, well we don't know that, because you didn't count!" Nico gave them both mock annoyed looks.

"You got out of it okay?" asked Bast, looking him up and down. "No injuries?"

"A couple bruises and one small cut." Nico held up his arm to reveal a gash that looked like it probably needed stitches. "Nothing really worth noting. But are you okay, Bast? We came as fast as we could after Anubis got your message."

"I'm fine," said Bast. "Thanks for showing up, by the way. You really saved me some time in getting out of there."

"What's the situation?" asked Anubis.

"Not good," said Bast. "Those demons you saw and helped me fight? They were only a fraction of what Apophis has got working on his cage, trying to crack him open. They were just the ones who could be spared to follow me when I moved to a different zone of compression."

Anubis sensed Nico's confusion and explained. "The part of the Duat where Apophis's cage is kept is the number one most time compressed place in existence, and the longer you're there, the most time is compressed for you."

"Oh. That's smart, I guess," said Nico. "So even though only minutes pass there, it's like days in the real world . . . then eventually years, if you're there long enough. So even if Apophis was able to bust out on his own, if it took him five centuries, that would end up being like . . . like five eternities in our world. My world. Or whatever. Ugh, just thinking about these screwed up logistics gives me a headache."

"The thing is, he's timing his release to be right when Sadie and Carter awaken Ra," said Bast. Her face was drawn and thoughtful.

"That . . ." Anubis trailed off.

"Doesn't sound good," finished Nico.

"We should let them know," said Anubis. Then he sent out slivers of his soul to as many places of mourning as he could, searching for the Kanes. Beside him he sensed Bast doing the same thing, except sending her soul into cats. Out the corner of his eye he saw Nico kneel down and cup his hands, then dip them into the water so that he could drink from them. The sight made him want to kick himself. How long had it been since his host had eaten or drunk last? He couldn't remember. Nico hadn't complained, but that didn't change the fact that it had been a long time, and Anubis needed to watch him better. He needed to remember that his host was a mortal and needed food, water, and sleep at regular intervals. It made him wonder if this was what having a pet was like, but he banished those thoughts as quickly as he possibly could, because he knew that if Nico even got a gleaning of them, he would flip out so bad it wouldn't be funny.

"Got them," said Bast. Her announcement interrupted Anubis's thoughts and he shifted his concentration to her. "I'm letting them know about the snake's plan. Let's see what they think about it . . ."

Anubis nodded, even though she wasn't paying any attention to him. Then he knelt beside Nico. "Are you hungry?"

"Yeah, actually . . ." Nico pulled his Ziploc baggy of ambrosia out of his jacket pocket. Anubis noted with some concern that there was only one square left.

"Is that all you've been eating since we started this trip?" he asked.

"Well . . . yeah." Nico looked sheepish.

Anubis snatched the baggy away from him. "That's dangerous! Do you want to burst into flames and die?"

"Not particularly. Why, do you?"

"Do not make light of this!"

Nico looked like he was going to yell at Anubis for a second, but at the last minute changed his mind and took a deep breath. "Alright. I'm sorry. I know it wasn't the smartest thing to do –"

At that Anubis snorted.

Nico gave him a dirty look. "Dude, I'm trying to be mature here. But we were in a hurry, and we didn't have any other food, and jackals don't exactly hunt. Besides, it's not like I've eaten that much of it. I only had three squares to begin with."

"So all you have had to eat since you woke up after the ritual was two squares of ambrosia?"

"I've gone longer without eating anything when I was living on the streets," pointed out Nico. "I'm okay with fasting."

Anubis sighed. He wanted to yell at Nico, wanted to vent at him, but the truth was, he was more responsible for this situation than Nico. He was the older one. He should have done a better job looking after his host. If he yelled at Nico it would only be him taking out his frustrations at himself on the boy.

"I'm not okay with you fasting," said Anubis after taking a moment to calm himself. "I'm sorry. I should have paid more attention. I will in the future."

Nico looked like he didn't know what to say, and so he said nothing, but Anubis could feel his confusion through their connection. And underneath the confusion he could feel a sliver of gratitude.

"If you're hungry I can fish up something for you," said Bast. "Why didn't you just say so?"

"Aren't you supposed to be talking with Sadie and Carter?" asked Anubis. It annoyed him that the cat had butted in, even though he was grateful she'd be getting Nico some real food.

"It was only Sadie I spoke with. Well, her and Walt. Now, now, hackles down, boys," said Bast.

Anubis started as he realized he'd been baring his teeth. He glanced at Nico quickly, just in time so see his host's jaw was clenched before Nico forced it to relax.

"Sadie and Carter split up," explained Bast. "Foolishly. Sadie found a lead on where Zia may be, and Carter has gone with Bes to try to save her. So Sadie had to call Walt and get him to go with her to get the next piece of the scroll. They're not exactly on a romantic vacation to an oasis."

"So Carter might have found Anubis's mom?" asked Nico.

"Their information is hardly reliable," growled Bast. "And to go haring off on his own at a time like this, leaving his sister with only that half trained sau to help her get past all those improperly mummified Romans . . ."

"Romans?" asked Nico.

Anubis sent Bast a warning look, which she either didn't see, or ignored . . . or possibly didn't understand. She'd been sealed away when the Greco-Roman gods made the decision to keep their Greek children separate from their Roman counterparts, and it wasn't something that came up in everyday conversation, so it was very possible she didn't know that Nico wasn't supposed to be told more about the Romans than he had to. Which wasn't to say that Anubis would keep information from him, if he thought that Nico needed it, but so far he hadn't needed to know anything about them, and Anubis knew all about the kind of things that had happened in the past when the Greek and Roman demigods clashed. He was of the opinion that the other pantheon(s) had been right in keeping their children separated, and made a mental note to let Bast know this at his earliest possible convenience.

He grated his teeth as Bast went off on a venom-filled diatribe about all the things she hated about Romans, and Anubis found himself agreeing with all of them, even if he was on edge, worried she'd say something about the demigods that would have to be explained to Nico. At least the cat was a master multi-tasker. She was able to insult Romans, brief them about the situation with Sadie, and fish up a meal out of the stream all at the same time.

"So to sum it all up, Sadie decided we need to go ahead with trying to awaken Ra anyway, and she wants us to head to Brooklyn House and rally the troops for what might be our last stand," said Bast.

"Last stand?" asked Nico, his voice very incredulous. "For a couple demons and a couple more demented magicians? After what we just went through today?"

"Don't forget, we're not this powerful in your realm," Anubis cautioned him. He could tell that this had all completely slipped Nico's mind by the way his shoulders immediately drooped.

"Oh yeah . . . I had forgotten," admitted Nico.

"I can only manifest through you in the main part of the house, and Bast's power is greatly reduced since her host is a house cat."

"Rub it in, why don't you?" muttered Bast.

"It's the truth."

"So we're in a bit of a bind," said Nico. "No worries. We've been in worse binds before. At least I have. I've always managed to get out alive. You're a cat, so you'll always land on your feet. And Anubis, you're connected to my soul, so I'll save you too. You don't have to worry."

"Cocky little thing." Anubis swatted playfully at his head. "Are you going to eat those fish Bast caught for you, or just stare at them?"

Nico looked down at the fish and looked suddenly sheepish. "I . . . uh . . . I don't know how . . . I've never cleaned a fish before."

Bast sighed dramatically and pulled out one of her knives. "I'll do it for you. You don't mind sushi, do you?"

Nico shrugged, not looking too concerned. "I've never had it."

"But you're willing to try it, and you're not making faces. You're a brave soul," said Bast in a very praising tone.

Anubis frowned. He and Bast might not be best friends, but he had gotten to know her well enough to know that something was off in her mannerisms. There was something she wasn't telling them, and it had to do with Nico. Normally, Bast would be calling him an uncouth barbarian for never having tried sushi, or else berating him for not knowing how to expertly fillet fish. Instead she was acting like she was his aunt and he was her favorite nephew.

"Bast? What are you not telling us?"

Bast flinched, realizing she'd been caught. "Nothing."

"You're hiding something, and from your mannerisms, it's something we need to know. Now tell us what."

Bast sighed. Then she did something that surprised Nico and Anubis both. She put a hand on Nico's shoulder as if to brace him. "You're not going to like this, but I guess you do need to be forewarned."

"Wh-what?" Nico looked at her hand on his shoulder, then back to her, clearly freaked out by the sudden contact.

"In Carter's vision where he saw the House of Life assembling their magicians and demons . . . one of the magicians he saw was Aziza."

AN:

Wow, a request for a long AN! Now I can die happy, lol. I read all reviews, even if I don't comment on them, and I take into account what all of you guys say. Thanks for the many book recommendations over the summer. I read as many as the local library had, or that I could borrow from friends, or afford with the money I earned.

In addition to participating in lots of sports this summer, I also did a kind-of internship at the local newspaper. Overall, I think I was good at it, but I didn't really like it because newswriting is way different than story writing. There's little room for creativity, b/c they only want the facts presented in the most succinct format, which I can get why they want that, but it's not something I enjoy doing. I hope it didn't affect my story style too much, and if you see places where you think it sounds like a dry news article, please point them out. I'm trying very hard to forget all about newswriting, lol.

Updates will come as frequently as I can manage them. I'm juggling a lot this semester, but I will do my best to post as much as possible. For the future I have planned a story that I'm very excited about, where Nico has to go undercover to explore the background of Maya (the little girl from Escape From Camp HalfBlood) and will include our favorite Roman demigods too. (This will take place after Crazy Feelings, Part 2.) I'm putting a lot of planning, and I've been thinking up ideas for it for months, so hopefully you'll like it a lot. Also, in the future, will be some stories on the lighter side about life at Brooklyn House, and how Sadie, Carter, Nico, and Anubis meet the noobies.

And one last thing, which has nothing to do with these stories, but which many of you will probably be able to appreciate. I (cue drum roll here) got half a dozen cheerleaders and other preppy-girl athletes addicted to role playing this summer. Long live Geekery, lol. But it's true, we were at a party and they were making fun of some of my other friends, and I can't stand bullying (last winter's soda-throwing incident was testament to that) but this time it got resolved without me getting grounded. The preppy girls are my friends too, but didn't know anything about RPGs, and I convinced them to try it out because, well, if you make fun of something you know nothing about, all it takes is one person who does know something about it to tear apart all your arguments. But they'd all read Mortal Instruments, so we based our impromptu RPG around that, and used my friend's dice earrings for rolling, lol. We all ended up playing until the party ended and have gotten together a couple times a month since to continue the game, and now my sisters in geekery are friends with my preppy friends too. Isn't that kind of awesome?


	6. Chapter 6

6

At first Anubis didn't even recognize the emotion that flooded his connection with Nico. It was only after looking at his host that he was able to figure out what it was: terror.

Nico's fists were clenched in a white-knuckled grip. His face, always pale, had gone a few shades lighter, so he looked eerily similar to a corpse. His eyes were wide and glassy and his breaths were coming in gasps.

"Nico?" asked Anubis, trying to mask his alarm.

Just as quickly as the terror had come, it was replaced by something else. A tidal wave of willpower and determination. Anubis watched as Nico made a monumental effort to fight down his fear, and he couldn't help but be impressed.

"What?" asked Nico in an almost normal voice. There was only the slightest waver in his tone, and his face looked normal again too. Only his hands remained clenched, and it was at those that Anubis looked at pointedly, to direct Nico's attention to them.

"Oh." Nico unclenched them and held them up. A trickle of black blood was oozing from one of them, where his nails had dug too far into his skin. "Oops."

"Are you okay?" asked Anubis.

"Yeah. Fine."

"You didn't look fine," said Bast.

Nico gave her a blistering look. "No one asked you."

"You are scared of Aziza," said Anubis.

"No," returned Nico.

"You are."

"Am not."

"There's no shame in it."

"I said I'm not freaking scared of her!" shouted Nico, his composure starting to fray.

Anubis could feel how badly Nico wanted that to be true, but he could also feel that it was a lie. It made him feel a bit bad, considering how hard Nico was trying to keep it hidden, but secrets between the two of them were very difficult to keep.

"She did kidnap and torture you," said Anubis, keeping his voice low. "She almost killed you, twice."

"Almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades," said Nico. "Speaking of which, that might be a good birthday present for Sadie. The hand grenades, I mean, not the horseshoes. Sure, she's got some powerful magic, but I think there are some situations that really just call for a good, old fashioned explosion that comes out of nowhere –"

"Stop trying to change the subject."

"I don't want to talk about Aziza," said Nico.

"If this is how you're going to act when she's just mentioned then how bad is it going to be when you actually confront her?" demanded Anubis.

"Oh, don't worry," said Nico. His eyes took on a hard light. "I'll deal with her, just you wait."

Anubis was hesitant to bring his next point up, especially in front of Bast, but felt like he had to. "You froze during your last encounter with her."

"I did not."

"Yes you did. When Percy and Carter broke you and Sadie out of that prison, before you got into the boat, you froze. The others didn't notice so much because Percy was battling it out with Aziza and Carter was trying to summon the boat, but you were paralyzed by your fear."

Nico folded his arms over his chest. "Okay . . . maybe I was scared of her, but now I'm just mad. And I'm not going to let her and her demon buddies destroy Brooklyn House. Next time I see her, I'm taking her out."

Anubis opened his mouth to say something else, but Bast held up a hand, stopping him. "Let it be," she said.

"Alright," conceded Anubis, even though he knew this wasn't over. He hoped that Nico would be okay when he confronted Aziza, but if he wasn't, Anubis wouldn't let him go through it alone. If Anubis had to, he could take over. Nico would hate it, but at least he'd be alive to hate it.

* * *

><p>They started moving again as soon as Nico finished eating.<p>

Nico was annoyed. He'd gone from feeling powerful and badass, high on the adrenaline from his fight with all those demons, to feeling like the world's biggest wuss. All because of freaking Aziza.

He did his best to keep his shields up so that Anubis couldn't spy on his thoughts, but knew that some of his anxiety had to be filtering through. But that was okay . . . because it was Anubis. And Anubis had been in his head so much now that Nico was pretty much used to it. In some ways it was actually reassuring to know he was never alone.

Besides, it wasn't like he didn't know what Anubis was thinking, even if Anubis was taking pains to try and hide it. If Nico froze, Anubis would just tag in. And while that would be annoying, it was good to have a failsafe.

On some level Nico appreciated how Anubis had his back like that. But on the other hand, the person Nico really wanted alongside him during this fight was Percy. He hoped that there'd be time to contact him and get him to come to Brooklyn House before the battle started. No offense to Anubis, or anything, but in the mortal world, Anubis was limited to acting through Nico. Unless they were in a graveyard. So in battle, anyone with Nico and Anubis on their side would get Nico _or_ Anubis, but not both of them at once. Percy wasn't stuck in a tag-team pair up. And he was a devastating destructive force all on his own. And he was probably the person Nico trusted most in the world.

"Are we there yet?" asked Nico when he grew tired of just dwelling on his own thoughts.

"Does it look like we're there?" asked Anubis.

"How long until we'll be there?"

"Awhile still."

"Any chance that Iris messages work in the Duat?" Nico wanted to know.

Anubis snorted impatiently while Bast sort of snickered.

Nico sighed. "I didn't think so."

* * *

><p>It would turn out, though Nico didn't know it at the time, that it wasn't necessary to Iris message Percy after all.<p>

When Brooklyn mysteriously caught on fire, Percy had been understandably concerned. Even more so when he realized that his little cousin was incommunicado.

He tried sending Nico an Iris Message first, but couldn't establish a connection. Then he tried calling Brooklyn House, where he knew Nico had been spending a lot of time lately. He got Carter on the phone, who told him that Nico had left over a week ago to look for something with Anubis, and was supposed to be back by now, but hadn't been heard from since.

After that, there wasn't much that Percy could do, except to wait and watch out for another sign that might help him find his cousin.

Several days later he got a phone call from Sadie.

He was in his room, staring at the ceiling. He should have been doing his homework, but his ADHD made it too hard to concentrate, especially since he was already distracted. When his mother tapped on his door he quickly sat up and pulled a book into his lap before calling for her to open it.

"You have a phone call," Sally told him.

"Nico?" he asked, jumping up.

She shook her head. "I think it's Sadie."

"Hey Percy," said Sadie as soon as he answered.

"Any word on Nico?" Percy wanted to know.

"Actually, yes," said Sadie. "Sorry, I guess I should have called you sooner, but there hasn't been time. I met up with Anubis a few days ago, just for a few minutes, and he told me that Nico got blasted deep in the Duat when they were doing a locator spell, because the scroll they were trying to divine the location of had been split in three pieces, and that it would be a few days before he could get out. Then I met Bast yesterday and she told me that Nico and Anubis took a detour and came to help her out because she got in a pinch. They're on their way to Brooklyn House now. They should get there around sundown, which is good, because we've got an army of Egyptian demons and House of Life freaks on their way there now, ready to burn our home to the ground."

"Right." Percy started looking for his shoes. "I'm on my way."

"Thanks. I knew I could count on you," said Sadie.

"You'd do the same for me"

"Our trainees are there right now. So is Amos –"

Percy groaned. "Oh man. That guy hates me."

"He doesn't hate you. He just doesn't like Greeks and Egyptians mixing, so he's wary of you. But anyway, he's there, and as soon as we can open some portals, Walt and Zia will be teleporting in."

"Zia? Carter's girlfriend who's hosting Anubis's mother?" asked Percy. "That Zia?"

"Yeah. Except she's not hosting Nephthys anymore. And she's not exactly Carter's girlfriend anymore either. It was her shabti that he hooked up with," explained Sadie. "But they'll arrive around the same time that Nico, Anubis, and Bast get there."

"How many demons are we talking about?" Percy wanted to know. "And how many magicians?"

"About a dozen magicians, twenty or so demons, and six flying, fire-breathing snakes."

"How many trainees do you have now?"

"You know Percy, I love it how I can tell you that there will be flying, fire-breathing snakes invading and you don't even bat an eye. We have about twenty trainees now, but Jaz was in a coma last time I checked."

"We're outnumbered pretty bad then," said Percy. "Magicians are a pain. It's hard to defend people other than myself from them, and am I right in guessing these guys were probably hand-picked for their skills, or at least their ruthlessness?"

"How'd you guess? But between you, Nico, Anubis, Bast, and our trainees, you should be okay, right?"

"I think so. It's easy to forget because he's always either getting into trouble or causing trouble, but Nico's one of the most powerful demigods alive. Anyone who underestimates him does so at their own peril."

"Aziza's going to be there."

Percy scowled. "You mean she didn't learn not to mess with us the first time?"

"We heard she was sent to Antarctica for that fiasco where she nearly pitted the House of Life against the House of Hades. She, along with most of the other magicians, were scouted from the worst personalities the House of Life has to offer, like you guessed. There are others coming who have murdered other members of the House of Life, and one who started a tsunami that killed lots of people."

"Just let him try starting a tsunami here," said Percy. "I'll make him eat it."

"That's what we love about you, Water Boy. Hey, I've got to go . . . but thanks again, Percy."

"How soon will you be able to get there?" Percy asked quickly.

"We'll be there at sunrise, assuming we live," said Sadie.

"Then I'll see you at sunrise." Percy refused to consider that they might fail.

After hanging up with Sadie, he finished lacing up his shoes, then grabbed the belt that Nico had given him for Christmas. It was more like a weight-lifting belt than the kind used to keep pants up, and it had been reinforced in the back with a layer of steel that covered the exact spot where Percy's only weakness was. Percy found it a bit eerie, and somehow doubted it was a coincidence. Nico was smarter than people gave him credit for, Percy knew. He was good at figuring things out. If he could just figure out how to stay out of trouble, Percy's life would be much easier, but since it didn't seem like that was going to happen anytime soon, Percy appreciated the armored belt. It could mean the difference between life and death for him.

"Mom? Paul? I found out where Nico is, so I'm going to meet him," Percy told his parents, giving them an abridged version of his plans. "Then we're going to head to Camp Half-Blood for the night, so don't wait up for us."

His mother looked at him with worried eyes. "Nico knows he's always welcome here, doesn't he?"

"Yeah, he knows," said Percy. "Or at least he's been told at least a dozen times before. We've just got something to take care of at camp. It's kind of hard to explain, but it's nothing you need to be worried about."

Sally looked a little more at ease. "Send Nico my love."

"Mom! I can't do that." Percy pulled a face and headed for the door. He felt a little bad about lying to his mother, but it was the only way to keep her from worrying. Besides, if Sadie and Carter failed, a few lies would be the least of their worries.

Percy took the subway to get him as close to Brooklyn House as it could. Then he got a cab to take him the rest of the way. It would have taken longer to call Blackjack to come get him than it did for him to get there on his own, and it wasn't like he didn't have plenty of time. The cab driver probably thought Percy was crazy, getting out in front of an abandoned warehouse, or else there to buy drugs, but Percy had been suspected of much worse in the past. He hurried up to the mansion. Amos met him at the door.

"Percy," he said, looking happier than usual at seeing a demigod. "Thank you for coming. If ever we needed allies . . ."

"I guess Nico's not here yet?" asked Percy. He was a bit uncomfortable with Amos's blatant gratitude, and much more comfortable with chaos and battle, as strange as that might be.

"Not yet. We're expecting Walt and Zia at sunset, on the roof. As for Nico and Bast –"

A shriek resounded from further inside. Percy pulled out Riptide and sprinted past Amos, glad for some action. And for an excuse not to have to talk with Amos. Trying to be polite to him was just awkward when he'd made his feelings so clear about how Egyptians and Greeks shouldn't mix.

It turned out to be a false alarm. The shriek had been given by one of the trainees whose name Percy didn't know, when Nico and Bast materialized right on top of the table where she and several other magicians in training had been working on charms, probably to use in the upcoming battle. Then Nico had fallen on top of one of them, since shadow traveling with other people tired him out, even more so when he was forced to do it during the day.

"Percy!" In his exhausted state, Nico seemed oblivious to his own plight as he saw his cousin burst into the room. "You're here!"

"Yeah," said Percy, finally able to relax, and unable to help smiling as Bast pulled Nico off the trainee he'd toppled into. "So are you."

"Who are you?" asked a trainee who Percy didn't know, and hadn't seen before. She was eyeing him and his sword warily as though she thought he might be their enemies' advance scout. "Bast, who is he?"

"That's my cousin!" said Nico happily and carelessly. "My extremely badass cousin! He's here to save the day!"

"You're punch drunk," said Bast, as she hauled him over to Percy.

"Am not."

"And this is Percy, everyone. He's Nico's cousin, and a powerful ally. Be nice to him, because we're lucky to have him here."

Percy raised one hand to wave at them all and used the other to grip Nico's jacket. "Hi."

"Hey guys," said Nico. "Guys, listen! My cousin . . . he's the best swordsman in the world, and he's going to kick all our enemies' butts!"

"If you're such a great magician, why haven't you been here before now?"

"He has, a few times," said one of the other trainees. "I've seen him stop by."

The truth was that, to an extent, everyone who knew of Nico's situation had agreed that the fewer people who knew, the better. No one knew what the consequences would be once it got out that Nico, a Greek demigod, was the host of an Egyptian god. For that reason, though all the trainees knew Nico, none of them had been told what had happened. Even though he lived with them, he kept his distance. They didn't know that he was a demigod, or that he was the host of Anubis. All they had been told was that his powers dealt with necromancy. Naturally, they assumed he was one of them, an Egyptian magician, and the fact that he dealt with death magic obviously made them a bit uncomfortable, so they didn't ask too many questions about why he came and went as he pleased, and rarely participated in classes with them. Percy knew that they eventually planned to tell their trainees that Nico was a demigod, who also had the ability to perform a bit of Egyptian magic. He guessed now was as good a time as any to let that cat out of its bag.

"I'm not a magician," Percy told them. "I'm not even Egyptian. I'm a demigod. My father is Poseidon, the Greek god of the ocean."

For several seconds everyone just stared at him.

Then one of the youngest trainees darted forward looking excited. "Poseidon? Really? Honestly? Wow! He has the highest elemental defense against fire of any Mythomagic card ever!"

"Uh, sure." Percy looked at the others to see how they were taking this. There were a few doubtful and confused looks, but no one seemed completely against the idea of it even being possible.

"Is it really alright for you to help us?" asked one of the girls, a bookish looking one who Percy thought he'd seen before but hadn't been introduced to. "I thought there was some kind of unspoken agreement that Egyptians and Greeks leave each other alone."

"I heard there was some kind of huge blow up in the House of Life a few months ago, and the Greek pantheon nearly declared war," said a teenage boy.

"Yeah," said Percy. "That happened when Nico first met Sadie and Carter, when they were being attacked by a few House of Life agents. Nico obviously wasn't going to stand by while two adults attacked two kids. It escalated, and there were some misunderstandings all around, but Hades thought that Nico had been kidnapped by the House of Life and was ready to kill anyone he had to in order to get him back. My dad, Athena, Apollo, Hermes, and Ares were all poised to join the attack, and the rest of the Olympians probably would have followed, but we got that straightened out in time."

"Nico! Your dad's Hades! No way!" the boy who liked Mythomagic looked awestruck. "His figurine's super rare, I've been looking for it for years and still haven't found it!"

"Wait . . . Nico's a demigod? So he's not a magician?" asked the bookish girl.

"I am a magician and a demigod," said Nico.

"There's a reason he has an affinity for necromancy," Percy told them.

"Oh, this is going to be great! With the sons of Hades and Poseidon on our side, there's no way we can lose!"

"Quiet, Felix."

"But Cleo . . . you don't understand how epic this is!"

"Felix is right," agreed Nico. "We'll have a unique elemental strategy that they'll never see coming. Paring up water and death might be unorthodox but if it's Percy and me we can make it work. We'll drag these House of Life freaks into a watery grave!"

Percy frowned at his cousin, recognizing Nico's senseless cheer as what it really was: extreme exhaustion. Who knew what he'd been doing in the Duat before getting back to the mortal realm? And then to have shadow traveled not just himself, but Bast as well, before it was even dark out.

"You need to rest," he told Nico. "I want you to get your strength back before the fight starts. Have you had any nectar or ambrosia?"

"That's about all he's had, the entire time he was in the Duat," said Bast. "Except for once when I caught him some fish. Anubis doesn't think he should have any more of it unless he gets injured, and for once, I agree with the mutt."

Percy shot her a warning look, then nodded. "You guys . . . sorry, I don't know your names yet, even though we're allies in this, but please keep up whatever you were doing to prepare. I'm going to make sure Nico gets to his room okay, then I'll come back and help you however I can. Any questions you have, I'll do my best to answer, and if you have any doubts about me, I'll do my best to remove those too. I'm in this with you guys, and I promise I'll pull my own weight."

He maneuvered Nico out of the room and toward the stairs. Behind him he heard the trainees begin talking amongst themselves.

"I don't know about this –"

"No, no, this is a good thing! If the Greek gods almost declared war on the House of Life last time they messed with their kids, it'll hamper the House's movements more this time. We can use this!"

"Still, I don't –"

"So what if Nico's a demigod? He's still the same guy he's always been, and we've never doubted what side he was on before. If he vouches for his cousin, that's good enough for me."

"Don't you guys get it? This is going to be epic! This is going to be Clash of the Titans meets Mythomagic: The Movie! We are going to pwn these noobs!"

Percy couldn't help but smile. "That went better than I expected it to."

Nico yawned. "Yeah. Wait'll they see you in action."

* * *

><p>AN: Next up: The battle for Brooklyn House!<p>

. . . actually, I've been kind of worrying about this part. You've probably noticed that my battle scenes are lacking compared to real authors like Rick Riordan, Heather Fleming, Susan Collins, and all the rest. Now I've got a twelve-hour-long fight to chronicle and I'm not sure what to do. The next few chapters will probably be on the short side, since breaking it up seems like the best way to deal with it. If anyone has any advice or suggestions, I would be very eager to hear them.

Also, I read the Son of Neptune last week, and loved it. Nico reminds me even more of Abdiel St. Jude after reading it. It kind of makes me want to do a crossover with the Gargoyle Legends, even though this is already a crossover with Kane Chronicles, lol.

I think I mentioned this before, but I've been getting a lot of questions about it lately, so I'll address it again: I'm not planning on following the Heroes of Olympus series with this fic. Just Kane Chronicles. Sorry, but I'm not a good enough writer yet to keep continuity with both series, but I think I can tell an entertaining story by doing my own thing with it. I will be bringing in the Romans (they've already made one appearance in this AU in the fic 'Crazy Feelings') but I'll be coming up with my own plotline for introducing them and bringing them, the Greeks, and the Egyptians together.


	7. Chapter 7

Sorry, I lied. Introducing Zia took longer than I thought it would. The real fight starts next chapter, but the first strikes are exchanged in this one. Enjoy!

7

When Zia and Walt portaled through to the sphinx statue on top of Brooklyn House, they found a welcoming committee waiting for them. Not a big one, but an unusual one. As expected, there were two young magicians, who Zia guessed were trainees of Sadie and Carter. Then there was Bast. The cat goddess. It made Zia's skin crawl to be in the presence of a goddess. It went against all of her training to suffer their presence . . . but it was necessary, however much it freaked her out.

The last member of the welcoming committee freaked Zia out even worse than the goddess. Zia didn't know how she knew, but the moment she laid eyes on the tall, dark-haired boy with sea-green eyes, she knew that she was in the presence of a son of Poseidon.

"Demigod," she said, and took a step back, ready to defend herself.

"What?" Walt looked at her sideways.

"How'd you know?" asked the demigod asked.

"I don't know," said Zia. "I just did."

"Residual knowledge that Nephthys left in your mind," said Bast. The cat goddess was staring at her sharply when Zia looked her way. "You are no longer the river goddess's host. Pity. We could have used the extra firepower. Or waterpower, as I guess it would be. But her consciousness melded with yours enough that you have some of her knowledge and instincts, whether you want it or not." Then under her breath she added, "That should make things interesting."

"What do you mean by that?" demanded Zia.

"You'll find out soon enough, darling. But where are my manners? I'm Bast, as you already must know. That's Julian, one of our trainees, this is Alyssa . . . and this, fine young demigod, who I have the privilege of introducing to you is Percy Jackson. The son of Poseidon."

It was the way Bast said 'Posiedon' that made Zia's hackles rise. It felt like a challenge and a threat, and on some level, Zia felt like she needed to destroy Percy. Not because of any malicious reasons, but because he was a danger to her. He was the son of a water deity whose domain was so much greater than her own. Not just Poseidon's son, but a power source as well, since the Greek gods drew strength from their children, their children's exploits, and worship, and she could take this opportunity to steal away some of Poseidon's power, ensure that what she needed to protect was safe, if only she could just destroy –

NO!

Zia stumbled backward, away from Percy.

_ That__ is__ not __me,_ she told herself angrily. _That __is __not __me! __Those__ thoughts__ aren__'__t __mine! __He __has __done __nothing __to __deserve __being __harmed, __so __I __will __reserve__ judgment!_

"Are you alright?"

The concern in those sea green eyes made Zia feel even worse.

"Yes. I'm fine." Zia looked away.

Percy didn't look convinced. He glanced at Bast, then the Egyptian magicians, as though he expected one of them to say something, then he seemed to remember that with the exception of Walt, they knew no more about her than he did. "Well, if you need help or something, just let one of us know, and we'll try to help you. But we need to concentrate on the house's defenses now. We just came up here to make sure it was you guys who portaled in, rather than the House of Life freaks. Why don't you come back down inside with us? Julian and Alyssa will be covering the roof during the battle."

"Actually," Zia spoke up, "I would like to request that post as well."

"Your specialty is fire, if I remember right, no?" asked Bast. Then she looked at Percy. "Up here she will be able to use her powers to their full extent. You remember what happened the last time we had a magician with a fire affinity fighting inside."

"Yeah. You're right."

"However, I would like to speak with Amos before the battle begins . . . and I would like to attempt to speak to the other magicians who are on the way, from the House of Life. We may be able to end this without fighting."

Bast snickered. Percy shot her a sharp glance, then nodded to Zia. "To be honest, I don't think they'll be willing to listen. You . . . you've been sleeping these past few months, right? So you missed the big blow up awhile back, when some people from the House of Life almost started a war with the Greek pantheon after they attacked a son of Hades."

Zia felt doubt creeping up inside of her, caused by knowledge that she also knew wasn't her own. "The entire Greek pantheon would not go to war over a son of Hades simply being attacked."

Percy looked a little frustrated, like he really didn't want to have to tell this story, and he kept glancing at Bast as though to look for cues from her. Zia wasn't sure if it was because as a demigod, there were certain things he wasn't supposed to reveal to Egyptians, or if it was something else. Somehow, she got the sense that it was something else.

"I'll sum it up as quickly as I can, since we don't have much time. A couple years ago, the Titans from Greek mythology, who ruled the world before the Greek gods, started to rise again. It was a mess. It started a war. We lost a lot of heroes. In fact, we almost lost everything. It was only at the final battle that we were able to pull together and seize victory, and only then because everyone, gods and demigods, realized that what really mattered the most was taking care of your family. Poseidon abandoned his palace and let it be destroyed to help his brothers and sisters chain Typhon, and Hades rose from the Underworld with an army of undead soldiers and defended Olympus in the other gods' absence. So when Hades's son was kidnapped, you can imagine how well that went over with everyone."

Zia stared in shock. "The House of Life actually kidnapped a demigod? B-but that – that is taboo! We're supposed to have as little to do with you guys as possible."

"It started off as a sort of misunderstanding," said Percy. "They didn't kidnap him in their first meeting, just attacked him, because he interfered when they were attacking Sadie and Carter."

"Why would he do that? The only people you like less than us are the Romans."

Bast coughed very loudly and quickly. "What Nico saw was two kids being attacked by two adults. He's not the kind of guy who can just do nothing when he sees innocent people being attacked. And anyway, they didn't kidnap him at that point, like Percy said. Hades got some faulty news, and when he wasn't able to get in touch with Nico, assumed the worst, and sent the House of Life a warning: Give me back my son or I kill you all. There was also something in the deal about how the ones responsible for Nico's disappearance be handed over to him, and something about an extended stay in Tartarus for them, and so what did the House of Life decide to do? They decided to kidnap him for real and try to throw the blame on Sadie and Carter rather than simply asking Nico to explain what really happened to his father. So what makes you think that talking with them is going to work this time?"

"I still must try," said Zia, though what she'd just heard had unnerved her. Then there was something else. Something uncurling in the back of her mind. She was pretty sure that it was something related to Nephthys. More residual knowledge or whatever the cat goddess had called it. Zia heard herself asking, "So is this Nico here today as well?"

There was definitely a look exchanged between Percy and Bast. "He is," said Percy. "He's resting right now, but I'll be getting him up soon. He was just . . . he just . . ."

"He was one of the people trying to save the world behind the scenes these past few weeks," said Bast. "Sadie and Carter may be the poster children, but there are a lot of people who don't want this world destroyed. Nico went through an exhausting ordeal that he only just returned from several hours ago."

"I would like to speak with him as well," said Zia. And she realized that she really did want to speak with this mysterious boy. She just didn't know why. There was no strategic value to it, and she knew almost nothing about him. She just really wanted to talk to him anyway.

Another look passed between Percy and Bast. Bast gave a shrug then Percy looked to Zia. "After this is all over. I'll introduce you to him then."

"What position will he be holding during this . . . siege, or whatever this is shaping up to be?" asked Zia.

"He'll be on the terrace with me, Bast, and most of the other magicians" said Percy. "We figure that is where they're likely to concentrate their attack. The layout of the roof makes it easier to defend. We'll have a small force with some of the younger students watching the door on the eastern side, even though it's heavily warded against enemies and intruders. Hopefully they won't have to see combat."

"If Nico is suffering from exhaustion, should he not be with that group?" asked Zia.

Percy gave a short laugh. "Just try suggesting that to him."

"At least tell him to be careful."

Percy cocked one eyebrow in a confused manner. "I think he knows to be careful."

"It's not his first party, magician," said Bast. "In fact, these children of the Big Three are extremely useful. What I'd give to have a dozen more like them on our side . . ."

Zia stiffened. "That would be bad." And it would be. For so many reasons. She wasn't entirely certain that she was on their side . . . and the idea of enemies of the House of Life building up an army of powerful demigods and Egyptian magicians was a scary one.

"Yes, that would be very bad for our enemies." Bast smiled, which made Zia's guard rise. But what she said next put Zia a bit more at ease. "Apophis wouldn't stand a chance."

It galled Zia a little bit, but Bast was right. Apophis was the real enemy . . . and here the House of Life was, attacking their own first line of defense.

Zia looked across the roof, toward the river, and tried to organize her thoughts. Ever since she'd woken up, she'd been in a constant state of confusion. It was like everything she'd known had changed while she was asleep, and she woke up to find the world was a completely different place.

Movement on the water caught her eye.

"Look there," she said, pointing. A fleet of Egyptian style boats were approaching. The enemy had arrived.

* * *

><p>"What? What's she doing?" demanded Nico. He couldn't believe what he'd just heard. "You didn't seriously send her out to parley with them!"<p>

"It was her idea," Percy told his irate little cousin. "And if there's a chance to end this without conflict, isn't that the best course of action?"

"End it without conflict? Have you been drinking Lethe water?" Nico had to make an effort to keep his voice down, otherwise he would have been howling. "Have you forgotten what happened the last time we dealt with them?"

"Of course not," said Percy. "I seriously doubt it's going to work either, but it's still better to make the attempt. I don't think that the House of Life is completely made up of bad people. The only way we can ever hope to reach them is if we keep trying to do the right thing."

Nico hated to admit it, but Percy had a point, but still . . . "The people in that strike force they're sending against us aren't the decent ones you're trying to reach. If they were, they wouldn't be marching on a house full of kids."

"I know but –"

"Aziza's with them, Percy. You know what she's like."

"Of course I do." Percy's eyes turned steely. "I haven't forgotten what she did to you, and don't think for a moment I'll ever forgive her for it."

Nico was a bit taken back by the fury he could suddenly see smoldering in Percy's eyes.

"When they attack, and there's no doubt in my mind that they will, I'm going to remind her why The House of Life's policy is to leave demigods alone. And then I'm going to remind her why she should stay the hell away from my family. Then if there's anything left, I'm going to remind her what tiger fish are."

Despite himself Nico smiled. It was hard to be afraid of Aziza when he had Percy right beside him, ready to beat her black and blue. And Anubis was on standby too, ready to tag in if he needed help. But most of the fighting would be done by Nico. It was one of the first things they'd established when trying to come to terms with their new status as roommates in each other's heads. Since it was Nico's body, and his life on the line, he remained in control during fights. Anubis only intervened if Nico was rendered incapable of fighting on his own, or if Nico needed help with a particular Egyptian spell.

Despite the fact that they were having a conversation, and looking toward each other at times, they both kept the majority of their attention on the waterfront, where Zia had just met the House of Life strike-force. They could see that she was trying to convince them of something. There was quite a bit of arm waving and raised voices as an argument broke out. Zia jabbed one finger toward the multitudes of demons that had been summoned.

"It's not going well," noted Percy.

"I am shocked by this sudden turn of events," said Nico blandly.

"Hey . . . I didn't mention this earlier because I assumed you were planning as much on your own, but when things go bad down there –"

"She's going to need someone to drag her out of there at the speed of darkness," finished Nico. "I'm way ahead of you."

"You have enough strength for that?" asked Percy.

"Yep. I feel much better after my nap and my Cup o' Soup. I can warp down there and back no problem. It's not far at all."

"But you'll be taking a passenger, and it's not fully dark yet," pointed out Percy.

"I can still do it. You know I can, or you would have asked me about it before now, right?"

"Right. But I didn't think it through well until now. Doing that's going to wipe you out, isn't it?"

"It's a short distance. I'll be okay."

The shouting was more pronounced now. The magicians' postures were changing. They were gearing up for a fight.

"Get ready," said Percy, his voice tense.

"I am ready," replied Nico, his attention riveted on the scene by the waterfront. He saw the exact moment when one of the enemy magicians started to raise his wand. Immediately, he merged with the shadows, teleporting the short distance down to Zia. He landed right behind her and grabbed her around the waist, because there was no time for tact or pleasantries. Just time enough to grab Zia and blend back into the shadows before the lead magician could blast Zia with his wand.

Nico's return to the roof wasn't nearly as neat or precise as his departure. The consecutive shadow trips took too much out of him, even if he was only traveling a couple dozen yards. He didn't manage to warp in close to Percy, and was off balance the moment the floor was solid under him. He stumbled backwards and tried to cling to Zia for balance, but Zia was in too much shock from the experience. They both fell backwards, Zia on top of Nico, knocking the wind out of him.

Percy and Walt hurried over to help them up.

"You okay, Zia?" asked Percy, even though he was focusing more on getting his cousin back to his feet, while Walt helped Zia up

"Yes. But . . . what was that?"

"Shadow travel," said Percy. "Nicely done, by the way, Nico."

"Th-thanks." Nico blinked rapidly hoping to ward off exhaustion. "I . . . is it alright if I sit down a second?"

"Are you alright?"

Suddenly, Nico felt someone seize his shoulders. His eyes widened as he realized that this Zia girl was staring at him with so much concern, even though they'd only just met. Or actually, they hadn't really met. This was their first time seeing each other face to face. So why did Zia somehow seem so familiar? And why did Nico not really mind her grabbing him and looking at him with such concern?

_It__'__s __a__ side __effect __of __both __of __you __hosting__ gods,_ Anubis spoke up. _She__ was__ Nephthys__'__s__ host._

_ But__ she__'__s __not__ anymore?__ And __what __would__ it __have __to __do __with __anything __even__ if __she __was?_ demanded Nico.

_Nephthys__ is__ my__ mother,_ Anubis reminded him.

_Oh, __right. __Oh__.__.__.__Oh ,__Hades. __That __means__.__.__.?_

_ Yeah. Some of the familial affection we have for each other will have been transferred to both of you._

_ . . ._

_ For __whatever __it__'__s __worth, __I__ am__ sorry, __Nico,_ Anubis told him. _I __know __how __you __feel __about __family. __I __would __never __have __done __this __to__ you__ deliberately. __I__ had __hoped __that __the __transference __would __be __minimal __but__ –_

_ We__ don__'__t __have__ time __for __this,_ said Nico. _We__'__ve __got __a__ battle __to __win, __remember?_

He stepped out of Zia's hold and stumbled toward Percy. "I'm fine. Leave me alone. We're about to get invaded. We should get down to the terrace."

"Actually," said Percy, "I want you to stay up here, Nico."

"You must be joking."

"I'm not. You need some time to recover from those jumps."

"I'm a melee fighter! This is going to be a magic sniping battle up here, Percy!"

"You can be their reserve and cut down anything that makes it too close."

"No! I want to kill some stuff downstairs!" shouted Nico. What he was actually thinking was, _You__ can__'__t __make __me __stay __here __with _her!

They had talked about this. They had decided that since Zia wasn't possessed by Nephthys anymore, if she didn't already know about Nico being Anubis's host, she didn't need to know, and that the best thing would be for Nico to stay away from her. If Nephthys was still in her mind, she would have been on their side by default, since Nephthys was a loving mother. Since Zia wasn't possessed anymore, it was better that she didn't learn about their situation, and wasn't given a chance to guess what had happened. No one knew what she would do if she figured it out.

"I'm serious, Nico. Stay here."

"I'm serious too, Percy. No."

The two cousins stared each other down. Or in Nico's case, tried to. Their staring match was called off when his knees started wobbling, and he almost fell. Percy grabbed his arm to keep him steady. Zia grabbed his other arm. Nico glared at her and she let go.

"You can either stay here and act as their reserve, or go join Felix and the other children and newbies and not see any action. Choose now."

When Percy had that look in his eyes, it meant there was no changing his mind. Nico might as well have tried to hold back the tides or convince a cyclone to start spinning the other way.

"I'll stay here," he muttered, then added under his breath, "you bastard."

"I heard that."

"Good!"

Percy rolled his eyes, then clapped one hand down on Nico's shoulder before turning to leave. "Stay safe, cousin."

Nico reverted back to serious mode. "You too. Watch your back."

Someone tapped him on the shoulder. Nico turned, ready to snarl at Zia to keep her hands off him, but it was just Walt.

"We should hold the stairwell. It's defensible, and if they get through that door they'll be inside the house."

"Thank you Captain Obvious," said Nico, but followed him and Zia back to the stairwell where Julian and Alyssa had already moved to. "By the way, when did we get a griffin? I'm pretty sure that wasn't here when I left."

"Long story," Walt told him. "But in short, that's Freak, Carter's new pet."

"We should have had Percy bring his hellhound."

"What?"

"Nothing. Nevermind." Nico closed his eyes and leaned against the wall. He heard something explode down on the terrace, where their enemies were apparently beginning their attack. "I don't have enough energy for any magic, so I guess I'll do what Percy said and cut down anything that gets too close. Everyone alright with that?"

"Yeah. Because no offense, but you look like hell," Julian told him.

"I look like Hades," Nico corrected him.

"Are you sure you're alright?" Zia asked again.

Nico's eyes shot open as he felt a warm hand on his forehead.

"You're as cold as ice!" Zia sounded shocked.

Nico batted her hand away. "Stop treating me like a child. Make yourself useful and go deal with those flying snakes that we've got incoming!"

"What? Oh –"

"He's right, we've got incoming," said Alyssa.

The magicians drew their weapons as the flying snakes swept downward, followed by half a dozen demons and an equal number of magicians.

A chill swept through Nico as he recognized one of those magicians.

"Hello, pet," Aziza called to him as she stepped forward, a malicious smile on her face.

* * *

><p>AN: Next chapter: the real fight starts.<p>

Does Percy make Kwai eat a tsunami? Do Zia and Aziza get into a catfight? Is anyone besides Bast even _allowed_ to get in a cat fight?

Read to find out!

Coming as soon as I can write it (and since I don't have any tests this week, that should be pretty quickly :)


	8. Chapter 8

8

Nico felt his heart leap into his throat. His mouth went dry and words failed him. All he could do was stare, dumbstruck, at his nemesis, held fast in the grip of his own fear.

_Steady,_ said Anubis in his mind. _You__ are __not __alone._

"Where's your cousin, pet? I owe him for that incident with the tiger fish," said Aziza, her tone nasty and biting.

There was a moment of silence. The others were probably waiting for Nico to say something. When he stayed silent, Nico felt their gazes turn toward him, but still, he couldn't find any words, or the strength to break free from his fear. He felt Anubis poised to take control of his body.

"If you're talking to Nico, he's not your pet," said Alyssa, before the silence could stretch on too long. "As you can see, he's not a flying, fire-breathing freak, or a Tragic Toys For Girls and Boys reject. We'll thank you to take your real pets and get the hell off our roof!"

Julian and Walt moved directly in front of Nico. They didn't speak, but their message was clear: If you want him, you'll have to go through us.

Then Zia stepped to the front, and Nico would have sworn he saw a distortion in the air around her, like heat glare, or the glow around a smoldering fire. "You will leave that boy alone, Aziza," said Zia, her voice as cold as ice.

"Zia, Zia, Zia." Aziza looked at her like something she'd found on the bottom of her shoe. "How the mighty have fallen."

"You really think you can defeat me?" asked Zia.

"Well," said Aziza, as she raised her staff, preparing to toss it, "I've always wanted to try."

Then she threw her staff, but not at Zia. It morphed into a giant cobra in midair, arcing over Julian's and Walt's heads, straight at Nico.

Nico reacted on instinct. His sword flashed through the darkness, and the snake's head was suddenly detached from its body.

_You__'__re__ petrified __by__ a __short __woman, __but __you __have __absolutely __no __problem__ at __all __with __giant __mutant__ freak __snakes?_ Anubis's voice was amused in his head.

_Yeah, __well__ –_

"AZIZA! You are DEAD!" The roof lit up like an inferno as Zia sent a wave of flames crashing toward their enemies.

Several demons were immediately incinerated. Others managed to get clear, and all the magicians managed to shield themselves with their magic. Mostly. One woman's hair caught on fire and she started screaming and running around in circles. A man's robes caught aflame as well, and he tackled the torch-headed woman and began rolling with her to smother the fire. All the rest just got off a little singed.

"What, are you shacking up with the demigod, Zia?" asked Aziza. "Is that where you've been all this time? He's a little young for you, isn't he?"

This time Zia sent a concentrated stream of flame at Aziza. Aziza responded with one of her own. The two streams of fire collided midway across the roof, each one trying to force the other back, neither managing to gain much ground. The temperature on the roof sky rocketed from that of a cool spring evening, to the temperature you'd expect to find in an oven. Everyone stared as the two fire magicians clashed. No one dared step forward, lest they be caught in the inferno.

_Is __that __your __mom__'__s __influence?__ That __protective __rage?_ Nico wanted to know. _Because__ if __it __is,__ I__ don__'__t __ever __want__ to __meet __your __mother._

_My __mother__ is __protective__.__.__. __but __not __like __that._ Anubis watched Zia uncertainly through Nico's eyes. _That __furious__ rage __is __all __Zia__'__s._

_Good__ to __know._ Nico frowned, as Zia began to lose ground. The stream of fire started getting pushed back toward her by Aziza's power. Zia was sweating, and not just from the sweltering temperature. _I__ think __she__ needs __help. __Open __my __Duat __locker __for __me?_

Anubis obliged, and Nico reached into the space in the Duat where he kept all manner of useful things stored, and pulled out a firecracker. He drew back his arm, then threw it as hard as he could, over Zia's head, over her fire, right toward Aziza. His aim was perfect. It dropped down right in front of her. Right in her stream of flames.

It exploded on contact, as firecrackers are wont to do. The proximity of the minor explosion was close enough to Aziza that it knocked her off her feet, breaking her concentration. Her own stream of fire died and she was engulfed by Zia's power, but she must have managed to get her shields up, just in time.

"Nice throw," Walt told Nico.

"Thank you." Nico grinned. There truly was no better way to get past your fear of someone than to see them get blown on their butt by a firecracker.

"Stay back, Nico," ordered Zia. "Let me handle her."

"Don't tell me what to do."

"Hey . . . have you two met before?" asked Julian. "Are you guys like relatives or something?"

Nico shook his head.

"Huh." Julian looked at Zia and shrugged. "Well, she's acting like a mother bear, but whatever. I'm just glad she's on our side."

"Yeah, me too."

That was all the time they had for chit chat. Aziza leapt back to her feet, ready for battle again, even though she was a sorry sight. Her skin was all red, like she had a really bad sunburn, but her eyes were furious. They locked onto Nico's, silently promising retribution, and despite his resolve not to be afraid of her, Nico felt his mouth go dry again.

Then the battle erupted in full force.

* * *

><p>"Percy, have I ever told you how much I love you?" asked Bast.<p>

Percy didn't even stop to look at her. He was too busy cutting down enemy shabtis and demons. The invaders had sent their fodder in first, soldiers that were expendable, to soften up the defenses before they joined in. Percy appreciated it. These dolls and weaker demons made for a nice warm up.

"No, Bast. You never told me," he said without breaking stride.

"Well I do love you. If someone had told me a couple thousand years ago that I'd be buddy-buddy with a Greek I'd have slit their throat and lapped up their blood like cream. But you, young demigod, are awesome to have around."

"Thanks . . . I think."

It was just Percy and Bast on the deck. The trainees were waiting just inside, in case something made it past them. They had decided that the best course of action would be to let them reserve their magic. The invaders were counting on them getting tired out before the enemy magicians even stepped in. Percy smiled, thinking of the shock they'd be in when they found the young magicians were completely fresh and ready to kick their butts.

As for Percy and Bast getting tired out . . . well that wasn't going to happen any time soon. Percy could do this all night.

Firelight from the roof was casting an eerie glow over everything. If Percy had to guess what was going on, he'd say Zia and Aziza had probably gotten into a flaming match. It seemed like they were having it harder up there than he and Bast were down here, and he thought about shouting to a few of the trainees to go help them out. But he held off on that. Amos knew the trainees better than Percy, and deemed that the team up there was a good match for anything the House of Life sent against them.

"If there's one area that Egyptians are lacking in, it's endurance. Magic saps our magicians' strength and wears them down too fast. You demigods . . . you can use your powers all day long, because they're a natural part of you, or whatever."

"Some powers," Percy corrected Bast. "Don't tell me you've forgotten what happens every time Nico shadow travels with extra people."

"Hmm, true. But still, he can fight all night if it's just him and his sword. And when you guys need to be recharged, all you have to do is chug some nectar or chomp down on some ambrosia –"

"And if we use too much of it we burn up," Percy reminded her.

"Kid, I'm trying to pay you a compliment here," said Bast. "All I'm saying is, I'm glad you're on our side."

"Oh. Thanks." Most of the first wave had been dispatched. It was getting easier to breathe now that most of their enemies had been reduced to clay crumbs and dust.

"You may now pay your compliments to me," said Bast. Well, it was more like she ordered it.

"Uh, right. You're a better fighter than Ares," said Percy. "I know this for a fact. I beat him once."

When he got a chance to look toward Bast, he would have sworn she was preening, even as she was slicing up shabtis. "There's a reason I was Ra's champion."

Then, suddenly, there were no more shabtis or demons to kill. Percy glanced toward the roof and saw that the fight was still going on up there. Flashes of light and bursts of fire continued to light up the night, and Percy thought he saw places where the shadows seemed thicker, and wondered if that was Nico's doing somehow. But he didn't have much time to dwell on that. The second wave arrived, quite literally, in the form of one magician atop a wall of water he'd pulled from the river.

Percy walked quickly to the edge of the terrace to face this new challenger, not quite able to believe what the magician was doing. "Let me guess," he hazarded. "You're Kwai?"

"I am. They call me Kwai of the Watery Death! Water heeds my every command. Twenty long years it took to master this power, to learn how to bend currents and streams to my whims, and this before you is the result. Surrender now, or you will be the first to drown!"

Percy and Bast exchanged glances. "He must not know who you are," said Bast.

"Yeah. I'm not sure whether I should point and laugh, or just let him have it," said Percy.

"You dare to mock me?" shouted Kwai. "I was responsible for the great tsunami in the Indian Ocean which claimed many lives, as I will now claim yours, you fool! Behold my power, foolish challenger –"

"Percy, please, just shut him up already," said Bast.

Percy grinned and raised one hand. "With pleasure."

* * *

><p>AN: This chapter, and the next few battle chapters will be on the short side, because I'm testing some things out and still getting ideas for the battle by analyzing other books with battle scenes. Twelve hours is a long time for a group of twenty kids to be fighting against a much larger force of demons and magicians, and I'm not sure how to draw it out to the length that it's supposed to be. But I'm learning as I go.<p>

Btw, does anyone else get reminded of the Egyptian demons by Tim Burton's Tragic Toys For Girls and Boys, or is that just me?

Next chappie will be up soon


	9. Chapter 9

9

All Percy had to do to seize control of Kwai's water wall was twitch one hand. He'd been a little worried that it might be a bit tricky since Kwai's magic had to be saturating every last drop in order for him to be standing on the water like it was a solid, as he was doing, but the water came at Percy's call as it had always done. He was the son of the sea god. The water naturally obeyed his commands.

Kwai's twenty long years of study went down the tubes in about five seconds flat. Ironically, that was the exact same amount of time it took him to fall all the way down to the river from which he'd drawn the water. Once Percy had taken control of it, his magic amounted to nothing, and he was no longer able to stand on top of the water.

Percy leaned over the railing and waited until he saw Kwai bob his way to the river's surface, then dropped the entire deluge of water right down on his head. It crashed down over him like a short lived waterfall, sending up a cloud of white mist.

"Hey Beni! It looks to me like you're on the wrong side of the river!" shouted Bast, leaning over the terrace rail.

Percy looked at her quizzically. "What?"

"Oh." Bast looked sheepish. "Something from a movie Sadie made Carter and Nico watch a couple weeks back."

Percy shrugged. "Okay."

He heard Kwai shouting curses at him, some in English, some in another language, or possibly two other languages. From what Percy could understand, mentions of his mother and barnyard animals were being made. That sparked Percy's temper. Insulting Sally Jackson was a line that Kwai shouldn't have crossed . . . and the stupid magician had yet to get out of the river.

"What's that?" Percy shouted down to him. "I can't hear you over the sound of that whirlpool sucking you under!"

Too late Kwai realized his mistake. He began trying to swim rapidly toward the bank, but it was useless.

Percy pointed one finger skyward and moved it in a circular motion, like a twister. Kwai was sucked under, his scream literally drowned out by the swirling water.

"Percy, have I ever told you how much I love you?" asked Bast.

"Yeah." Percy smirked. "Just a few minutes ago."

"Well, I'm a firm believer that you can never say that to the people you love too many times," said Bast in a breezy manner. "Let's hope Kwai told that to everyone he loves before coming here."

"You know I'm not actually going to kill him," said Percy.

Bast sighed. "I know. But I can dream."

Percy glanced back toward the roof where a fire fight was still raging, and realized that no, it wasn't his imagination, there were definitely streaks of shadows that were thicker than the rest of the night, and he knew that was somehow Nico's doing.

* * *

><p>The flying snakes were a problem. The way the flitted about, spitting fire made them very dangerous to the magicians on Nico's side. Freak the Egyptian griffin was their only air support, and he was doing his best to attack them, but he was sorely outnumbered. If this kept up, the griffin would be killed.<p>

_Nico, __I__ have __an __idea,_ Anubis told him. _Those__ are __creatures __of__ the __sun.__ Creatures__ of __the __day._

_Okay.__ And?_

_ And you are a prince of the night. You control the shadows. _

_ You __think __I __can __drive __them__ off? _Nico asked. _With__ shadows?_

_ With your ability to control shadows, using my reserves of power. Focus on bending the shadows as you do at night, when you want to disappear, then arc them toward the uraei._

_ Like__ Hades__'__s __shadow__-blades __in __Mythomagic!__ You__'__re __a __genius!_ Nico glanced around at his allies. They were all locked in battle, doing the best they could against the demons, magicians, and flying snakes. He was already backed up against the stairwell and they were already covering him since he didn't have enough energy to use much Egyptian magic, after his excursion in the Duat. But if he drew on Anubis's strength, he could still use his demigod powers. He would be vulnerable if something got past his comrades, but not completely defenseless. He could still act as the last line of defense on the roof and keep the flying snakes at bay while he was at it.

Nico dropped to one knee and let the tip of his sword sink into the roof. Then he used his sword as a magnet, and focused on drawing all of the shadows through it, to him, then bent them to his will.

Zia was facing off against Aziza and was being dive-bombed by two of the flying snakes, so Nico targeted them first. He sent out concentrated waves of darkness, like black lightning, and slashed at the two snakes. He didn't hit them. The snakes sensed his attack coming and scrambled to get away from it. It was clear that they didn't want Nico's shadow attacks coming anywhere near them, which was fine with Nico. He wasn't even sure if his shadows could kill them, or if they could even harm anything, and now really wasn't the best time to be testing out new attacks. He'd settle for keeping the stupid winged snakes away from the roof.

_That __is __probably __the __best __course __of __action,_ Anubis told him.

_I __think __so __too._ Nico pulled more shadows to him and lashed out at the other uraei. Those flying snakes followed suit and rose high about the roof, out of Nico's range. _But__ sometimes __I __wish __that __I__ could__ shoot__ stuff __dead. __Apollo__'__s __kids __don__'__t __know__ how __easy __they__'__ve __got __it._

Nico maintained his position in front of the door to the stairs, watching to make sure that his friends were okay, and keeping the uraei at bay as well. Every time one got too cocky and started edging back down toward the roof, Nico sent a tendril of shadows cracking toward them again, reminding them why they needed to be afraid of the dark.

_This __isn__'__t __taking __too __much __power.__ I __should __be __able __to __keep __this __up__ awhile._

_ It__ will __be __much __harder __as__ dawn__ draws __closer,_Anubis warned him._You __will __probably __notice __it __becoming __more__ difficult __right __after __midnight._

_ Yeah._ Nico had to agree with him. _But__ by __dawn __Sadie __and __Carter __will __have __returned __with __Ra._

_ Unless –_

_ They __will. __You __and __I __haven__'__t __caused __the __end __of __the __world __yet,__ which __means __that __Apophis __can__'__t __cause __the __end __of __the__ world __either. __Which __means__ that __Sadie __and__ Carter __will __definitely__ be __back,_ insisted Nico.

_I__ love __how__ you__'__re__ so __optimistic __about __our __situation._

_ Don't call me an optimist, noob! I'm just saying that it's physically impossible for Apophis to destroy the world when we're supposed to give rise to the end of days, or whatever the mad oracle said we were going to do. Doesn't he know if you try to stop prophecies they always blow up in your face?_

_ Well what do you call what we've been doing, Nico?_

_ Trying to achieve the outcome of that prophecy that leads to the least amount of damage possible. Have you considered we might just open a night club called 'End of Days?'_

Anubis chuckled in his mind. _This __is __why __I__ call __you__ an __optimist._

* * *

><p>Percy's oh-so-casual defeat of Kwai had obviously unsettled the invaders. They hung back for a few minutes, discussing what to do next. Bast shouted some insults down at them, and continued taunting them all during their discussion. Percy couldn't keep his attention away from the roof.<p>

"Hey Bast," he said, finally pulling her attention away from her taunting. "Look up at the roof. See those shadows?"

"Huh? Oh. Yes, I see what you mean. Is that something Nico's doing?"

"I don't know. I was going to ask if it was some kind of Egyptian magic, but if you don't know it, it's probably him."

"He's your cousin, and a demigod. Shouldn't you know?"

"There hasn't been a single child of Hades born since the 1930s. I don't know all of what the children of the Underworld are capable of. It might be written down somewhere, but I doubt it, and Nico keeps things pretty close to the vest in case you haven't noticed."

"True. He kind of reminds me of a junior G-man," said Bast. "You know if he survives to adulthood, he'd make your government one hell of a secret agent."

Percy considered Nico's ability to turn invisible in the darkness, and teleport through shadows and nodded. "Yeah. He definitely would."

They watched as the House of Life freaks left their vantage point down by the river and tried to slink around the building.

"You think they're going to try the front doors?" asked Percy.

"Seems like it."

"And you're sure they will hold?"

"They'll hold for a long time," Bast told him. "Nothing can hold up forever against magic onslaught, but it'll take them hours to bust through, throwing everything they have at it."

"Good. That buys us some time. We're trying to hold out until dawn, right?"

"Yes. Then we'll know if Sadie and Carter have succeeded or not. And if they haven't, it won't matter if we win or lose. We'll all die anyway."

"Like Hades we will," snapped Percy. "No offense, but you guys aren't the only gods in town. Nor is your pantheon the only one that's spawned wing-nuts who want to destroy the world. We've dealt with psychos like that before, we can deal with them again. No one gets to destroy the world, Greek or Egyptian. Not on my watch."

Bast gave a sort of bitter smile. "Hearing you say that with so much conviction is almost enough to make me believe it."

"I don't care if you believe it or not. I fought Kronos to a standstill. I'll face down Apophis if I have to, while Nico shadow travels to Olympus and gets back up. Or do you think our pantheon is going to sit by and do nothing while your chaos snake swallows the sun?"

When Bast smiled again, it was a bit more genuine, but also held more sorrow. "Since Sadie and Carter's parents released me from my eternal fight with Apophis, I've seen many things that I never thought could be possible. Perhaps it is possible to beat him without my king."

_But __she __doesn__'__t __want__ to,_ Percy realized. And he could understand why. He tried to imagine how hard it would be for him to keep fighting if the deity he was most devoted to was destroyed forever, but somehow he couldn't imagine a world without Poseidon.

"Don't count Sadie and Carter out yet," Percy told her. "Wait until dawn, and we mortals will show you something else you never thought possible. I guarantee it."

* * *

><p>AN: Next chapter: Zia and Aziza clash. Percy and Bast get a chance to catch their breath. And Felix summarizes Kwai's fate for the roof team. It will probably be another short chapter, but I think I can get it posted by Friday, Saturday at the latest.<p> 


	10. Chapter 10

10

Aziza had grown stronger, as much as Zia hated to admit it. Or maybe she was just out of practice. Magic induced sleep did not do a magician good, much to her chagrin. There had been a time when Zia could have schooled Aziza in five minutes flat, then mopped up the rest of the invaders without breaking a sweat. But it seemed that times had changed.

She had to admit, her allies were no slouches. Walt was a very good magician, and though the other two magicians had the air of those who hadn't been using magic very long, they made good use of their natural talent. Zia could easily see why the House of Life felt so threatened by the inhabitants of Brooklyn House.

Then there was Nico, who she was actually trying hard not to think about. Her strange protective instincts toward him made it hard to concentrate. She still could not fathom why his mere presence produced such a strong reaction, but there it was, and it didn't seem to want to go away.

Or maybe she was just using that as an excuse for her own lethargy and shortcomings. Zia didn't think that was the case, but there was no denying that her powers were lacking compared to what they normally were. If things kept up at the rate they were going, she wasn't going to last until dawn.

"What's the matter, Zia?" taunted Aziza. "You're looking tired."

"I'm tired of looking at you!" shot back Zia. "Why don't you run home before you embarrass yourself further!"

The other invading magicians had been driven back by Walt's Alyssa's, and Julian's onslaught. The uraei were being kept at bay by some strange shadow magic that Nico was using. And while all that was impressive, Zia's fight with Aziza was clearly the main event on the rooftop that night. Both fire magicians kept summoning burst after burst of fire. Had Brooklyn House not been shielded, it probably would have looked like a lighthouse to mortal eyes.

But try as she might, Zia couldn't manage to outmaneuver Aziza. The best thing that could be said of her performance so far was that Aziza hadn't managed to outmaneuver her either, and it was definitely not for lack of trying.

Her clothes were soaked with sweat from the fire's scorching heat, but Zia wasn't singed yet. Unlike Aziza whose robes were charred around the edges, and whose skin was an angry, irritated red.

The two girls got locked in another clash of strength as they each summoned a stream of fire and tried to force all the flames back on the other. They remained deadlocked for nearly a full minute, then Zia began gaining ground. Slowly her stream pushed the clashing point back toward Aziza, who began backing up, trying to keep it further from her. Confidence gave Zia another surge of strength, and she pushed even harder, determined to win this showdown.

Aziza screamed from the effort, or maybe from frustration. Her flames seemed to increase in brightness, but not in strength, and Zia's edged ever closer.

"You can't win this, Zia!" screamed Aziza.

"I can!" shouted Zia right back at her. "I will!"

"You are just one magician! All your allies are either rookies or demigods! Do you know how easily we defeated them in the past?" called Aziza.

"I know how you nearly brought down the Greek gods' wrath on the entire House of Life!"

"Do you know how I tortured your little friend there too?" asked Aziza.

That was the wrong thing for her to say. Zia's rage flared up, and with it, her flames. Aziza was blasted backwards as the clashing point reached her and exploded right as it reached her. Zia felt a surge of satisfaction as she watched as Aziza was blown clear off the roof.

"Sadistic witch!" shouted Zia after her. "I will make sure you get what you deserve!"

"Go Zia!" cheered Alyssa.

"Nice one," agreed Walt.

"Show her how it's done!" called Julian.

The only one who didn't cheer Zia on was Nico. She sneaked a glance toward him and saw that he was watching, but seemed too drained to speak. He managed to give her a tired smile, then turned his attention back to the uraei.

With Aziza's fall, the enemy seemed to be pulling back, perhaps to regroup. Zia wasn't sure if it was a trick or not, at first, and watched warily as they all retreated to the opposite edge of the roof. Then they retreated further, some using their magic to levitate them down, others using bird charms brought to life.

Julian hurried to the edge after them and watched them go. "They've gone down to join with their comrades. It looks like they're having a strategy meeting and they're not attacking the terrace anymore either."

Zia looked up and saw that the uraei had retreated with their keepers as well. She turned toward Nico again and saw him slumped against the stairwell's door, ashen-faced, sweating, and breathing heavily.

Before she could sprint toward him, Alyssa reached his side and dropped down beside him. They spoke softly, so Zia couldn't hear what they were saying, but Nico nodded to Alyssa then closed his eyes.

"One of us needs to go report this to Percy and Amos," said Walt, taking command of their little group. "Julian, do you mind?"

Julian agreed readily. "I want to hear what happened down there too."

"Get some food for us while you're down there," said Alyssa. "Something high in sugar or caffeine, or preferably both."

Julian nodded again and headed to the door. "Sorry, Nico, but you're going to have to move for a second."

"S'alright," said Nico as he drug himself away from the door.

Zia forced herself to move toward him slowly, then knelt so that she was beside him. "Are you okay?" she asked.

Nico opened his eyes and gave her a tired smile. "Yes. Just exhausted."

"I'd cast Undead Malediction on you to recharge you if I could," said Felix, suddenly at the top of the stairs, his arms laden with food in brightly packaged wrappers. Zia wasn't quite up to date with the modern world, but she was able to recognize several of the more popular candy bars, like Snickers and Hershey's, and there were some things in clear wrappers that appeared to be snack cakes. "And before you guys ask, yes, I have permission to be up here. Julian asked me to bring you guys some food and stuff. Who wants a Pepsi?"

Nico gave a very tired laugh and watched as Felix pulled apart the six pack of Pepsis. "You're awesome, Felix."

"I'm not supposed to 'linger' up here, but you guys want to know what's going on, yeah?" said Felix. "Well they sent a bunch of shabtis and some demons at the terrace, and Bast and Percy cut them down and were like, 'Fools, send us a real enemy to fight!' So the House of Life freaks sent this guy who controlled water up against them –"

"Oh, gods!" Nico choked then doubled over laughing. "Of all the people to send against Percy!"

"Yeah, seriously," agreed Felix. "That's like pitting a level one water sprite against Poseidon! Then Bast and Percy were like, 'Oh no you didn't just challenge the son of Poseidon with his own element!' And then Percy took control of the water that the guy was levitating on top of, and suddenly the water wouldn't hold him up anymore, so he went crashing down, like a barrel off Niagra falls, and then SPLASH! He hit the river! And Percy and Bast watched over the railing and waited until he came up for air and KABOOM! He dropped all the water the guy had been controlling down on top of him! It was sick!"

"I told you my cousin was badass."

"You shouldn't use words like that," Zia told him.

Nico gave her an incredulous look.

Zia bit her lip. Why had she just said that? She didn't know for the life of her.

"Are you trying to tell me my cousin is not badass?" Nico asked accusingly.

"There's no way anyone can say Percy's not badass," said Felix firmly.

"So . . . what's going on now?" asked Alyssa.

"Uh, well they're trying to break down the front doors on the east wall. Amos says that will buy us some time. He's got every protective spell known to magicians on that wall, and they'll have to blast through each one individually. That will take hours."

"Good. Maybe we'll get a bit of a break," said Walt as he cracked open his soda.

* * *

><p>"I don't understand them," said Percy. "Wouldn't it make more sense for them to throw an actual wave of magicians at us now, and keep trying to wear us down here, rather than wearing themselves down, beating their magic against a wall?"<p>

"They are the most ruthless that the House of Life has to offer," Amos told him. "No one ever accused them of being the smartest."

"Lucky for us," said Bast.

They were standing just inside the house, right next to the terrace doors, waiting as the invaders threw spell after spell at the east wall's doors. The fight seemed to have died out on the roof as well, and Percy wished he could go up and check on them, but knew it was better that he stayed at his post. He felt a surge of relief when he saw Julian walking toward them, quickly, but not too urgently, a tired smile on his face. That was good. It definitely meant no one had been killed or even badly injured, or else he wouldn't have been wearing such an easy-going expression.

"How's Nico?" Percy asked, because he wanted to know how his cousin was holding up, even though he already knew he hadn't been hurt.

"He's fine. Tired, but fine. He really saved our butts up there, against those flying, fire-breathing snake things," said Julian. He grinned at Bast. "You were right. We could use another dozen like these two on our side."

Then he looked back at Percy. "I'm sorry that I ever had any doubts."

"Don't worry about it," Percy told him. "Is everyone else alright on the roof?"

"Yeah. I sent Felix up there to take them some food because we all need to recharge our batteries, but I thought we should let you know what went on, so I came down here."

Julian quickly explained everything that had gone on up on top of the roof for the past hour, then Percy gave him a summary of how things had played out on the terrace. All the while they heard loud thuds, and minor explosions as the invaders tried to chisel away the defenses on the east wall.

"Do you think we should switch the roof team out?" Percy asked to Bast and Amos once everyone was up to speed. "We could put some of your other senior trainees up there and let the old team rest up completely."

Amos considered this for a few moments then shook his head. "The trainees we have up there now are the best at taking the initiative. All the rest look to someone else to lead them. We must keep those who will not hesitate to act on the roof."

Percy filed this useful bit of information away in his mind. He was sure he'd have reason to use it again sometime in the future. It seemed like he couldn't go half a year without seeing a large scale battle these days.

"Are there any problems between Zia and Nico?" asked Percy, voicing his final concern. They had agreed it was better to keep those two separate, but now with circumstances as they were, if Nico and Zia weren't causing major problems, it might be best to leave them at the same post for now.

"Huh? Well, they're not arguing or anything," said Julian. "Zia's actually pretty defensive of him. There was this one House of Life freak up there who seemed to know Nico. She kept calling him pet and he seemed really freaked out by her –"

"Aziza?" Percy asked darkly.

"Yeah, that sounds right. Nico froze at first, but when she tried to kill him with a giant cobra, Nico snapped back to it. But then Zia took on Aziza. You probably saw fireworks from the terrace."

"Yeah," said Percy.

"Maybe it was just in my head that she was being all defensive of Nico, because she seemed to have some kind of rivalry with Aziza that had nothing to do with him."

"Aziza has always been jealous of Zia's abilities," said Amos. "Zia was taken into the House of Life when her family was destroyed. She doesn't know her own roots. While Aziza's family is one of the oldest bloodlines that can be boasted of. She has never been able to stand that Zia is a better magician than her, or that her connection to fire is stronger."

"I should get back up there," said Julian. "I just wanted to let you all know what was going on, and see how things were down here."

"We're hanging in here," Percy told him. "You guys keep up the good work up there. Let us know if you need more reinforcements."

"And tell Felix to stop lingering up there," said Bast. "You know he's still going to be up there when you get back."

Percy turned back to watch the terrace. He felt good about the way things were going so far, but he doubted everything would keep going so smoothly. The enemy might be giving them a reprieve now, but the battle was far from over.

* * *

><p>AN: Yesterday I got my long-awaited copy of Crumbled Colossus. I started reading it after I posted yesterday's chapter, then read more during school, then finished it up at home. Then I wrote this chapter. Now I have to do my homework before I go to bed, and it's about 2:00 am. Yay for priorities, lol. Thankfully I have study-hall tomorrow, so I can do some then. You know how when you read a really great book, or watch a great movie, you get really inspired and have the urge to write? That's how I've been since Son of Neptune came out. Now I've got another boost of inspiration from the new Gargoyle book. (which was excellent, btw) I should be fired up all the way through the end of this fic now. (I'll make you a deal: if I slow down to less than two chapters a week, you can tell me to shut up about my beloved Gargoyle Legends. As long as I'm updating fast, you can put up with my hero worship of Heather Fleming's creations) The next thing I'm looking forward to is Clockwork Prince in Dec, but I'll be finished with this fic long before then.<p>

But about this fic: I'm not shipping Nico and Zia. Their feelings for each other are strictly familial. This isn't going to turn into some kind of messed up, Oedipus Rex revival. 'G-man' is short for 'government-man' and is used to refer to FBI and CIA agents, for those who wondered. The movie quote from last chap was from 'The Mummy' so congrats to Gillrocks and Crazyfruit89 for recognizing it! (Another reference to that movie was made at the beginning of Escape from Camp Half-Blood, so I guess it's turning into a recurring joke. Maybe I'll do a one shot about them having a movie night)

Next chapter will mark the halfway point in the timeline of the battle. Some time passes between the chapters while the invaders are trying to break down the east wall, so our heroes got a bit of a break. And coming up (probably not next chapter, but soon) Zia vs. Kwai. And some serious injuries. Alright, better do homework now. Asilda out.


	11. Chapter 11

11

They attacked the roof again an hour after midnight, in greater numbers than before.

"I guess they got tired of pounding against the east wall," said Alyssa as they watched their enemies come.

"Good. I was getting bored." Julian stood and stretched, a violent smirk on his face.

"The night is a little more than half over," said Walt. "We just have to hold out for five more hours."

"Just a warning," Nico told them, "I doubt I'll be able to keep the flying snakes away after dawn. They're day creatures, so I'm using the power of the night to drive them back, but after it gets light . . ."

"Just do what you can," Alyssa told him.

Nico glanced sideways at Zia, expecting her to say something, but she held her tongue. For that, Nico was grateful. Being around her was extremely awkward. He wondered how long it would take her to realize that the feelings Nephthys forced her to have about him were maternal in nature. From there it wasn't a very big jump to realize that Nico was hosting Anubis.

There was always the chance that she could misinterpret what she was feeling, but Nico didn't want that to happen either. If she started thinking of him as her little brother . . . well he would have a really big problem with that. No one could replace Bianca, and Nico knew he would end up hating anyone who tried. And if Zia started thinking that she cared for him in some kind of romantic way, Nico just might have to kill himself. He had no desire to get caught up in some twisted modern-day retelling Oedipus Rex. Carter would not be happy about that either.

Nope. The best thing for him to do was just avoid her.

Despite that, Nico found himself keeping an eye on Zia as the battle began again, more so than any of his other friends. Ironically, she was the one who probably needed watching over the least.

_She__'__s __a __good __magician,_ Nico commented to Anubis, who was watching the battle through his eyes.

_She __is. __But__ then, __she __has __to __be __in __order __to __have __hosted __my __mother. __Though __what __my __mother __would __want __with __a __hostess __who __specialized __in __fire __magic, __I__'__ll __never __know.__ I __suppose __she __is __looking __for __a __new__ host __now__ that __she __has __moved __on __from__ Zia._

_ If __you __see __her, __you__ better __warn __her __to __stay __away __from __Percy,_Nico told him _I __don__'__t__ mean __just __not __considering __him, __I __mean __keeping __her __distance __from __him. __I __don__'__t __even __want __her __in __the __same __room__ as __him,__ because __if __she __touches __him __and __what __happened__ to __us__ happens __to__ them__.__.__._

_ That would be bad._

_ You have no idea. Wait, you're in my head, so yeah you do. But there's no way Percy will be able to keep what happened from other people. Poseidon's more understanding than Hades or Zeus, so he might not start a war like my dad would, but if Zeus finds out that both Hades and Poseidon have children who are demigodlings . . ._

_ I__ will __keep __my __mother __away__ from __your __cousin,_ Anubis promised.

Right as they finished talking, a demon broke past the four defending magicians and charged Nico.

Nico's reflexes weren't up to par, since he'd been putting himself through nonstop abuse since he and Anubis left for the Duat however long ago that was, but he was still the son of Hades. He brought his sword up and deflected a blow that would have skewered him like shish-kabob. Then he calmly sliced his Stygian blade through the demon's neck. And then he was nearly roasted alive as a stream of fire shot toward him. He dove to the side with a cry of pain, and was alarmed to see that his sleeve had caught on fire.

_Stop, __drop, __and __roll!_ ordered Anubis.

_What!_ Nico tried to bat the fire out but only succeeded in burning his hand.

_Stop,__ drop, __and __roll, __Nico!_

That made no sense to Nico, who dismissed the god's cryptic advice and tried to frantically remember if he knew a spell for water.

_Argh!__ Just __let __me!_ Anubis seized control without waiting for permission. Nico had already been sitting, but Anubis made him slump all the way to the ground, crossed his arms over his chest, and rolled to smother the flames. _Didn__'__t__ they __teach __you __how __to __stop, __drop, __and __roll __in__ school?_

_ I don't even know what that means! And I don't go to school_

_ . . . We will discuss this later. It's something you should know._

_ Whatever._

Nico sat up the moment Anubis gave him control again. Just in time to be grabbed by Zia, who gripped both his shoulders.

"Nico! I'm so sorry! I didn't mean –"

_"__You _set me on fire?" asked Nico incredulously. _"__You?__"_

"It was an accident! I was trying to kill the demon –"

"Get down!" Nico tackled Zia as one of the uraei swooped down low and exhaled flames toward them. He screamed in pain again as he felt the back of his shirt catch fire.

He landed on top of Zia, shielding her from the blast, then rolled off of her, onto his back, copying what Anubis had done earlier to smother the flames.

Nico began cursing in Italian even before he launched himself up off the floor, into the air as high as he could, sword raised even higher over his head. It was a good jump. He was pretty sure that he cleared five feet, which put him high enough to slice the presumptuous snake in half. "Take that!"

He landed right next to Zia, in time for both of them to be showered in golden monster dust. Some of it got in Nico's mouth. He spit it out in disgust.

"I hate snakes!" he shouted, just to make sure everyone knew. "I _hate_ them! Why are all your stupid Egyptian monsters based off snakes? You guys SUCK!"

_Calm__ down!_

"You calm down! You're not the one who just got set on fire twice!" Nico raised his sword and pointed it at another uraei, and sent an arc of shadows whipping toward it, driving it back again, then diverted that same shadow toward two others who'd been coming too close to the roof.

"I am truly sorry, Nico," said Zia. "I didn't mean to!"

The look of genuine distress on Zia's face stole some of Nico's anger away. And by some, that means most of it. It tore at his heart, seeing her so unhappy, like she was on the verge of tears. He wanted to chase those feelings away, make her smile again . . .

As soon as he realized what he was thinking, Nico felt a wave of annoyance at himself.

"Don't worry about it," he said gruffly to her. "I've survived much worse."

He held out a hand to help her up. She hesitated for a moment, then took it, and let him pull her off the ground. Then she charged back into the fight.

_Are __you __okay?_ Anubis wanted to know.

_My __back__'__s __a__ little __scorched,__ but __it __won__'__t __slow __me__ down __much._

_ That's not what I was asking about._

_ Gods,__ you__'__re__ annoying,_ complained Nico. _And __in __case __you __haven__'__t__ noticed, __I__'__m __in __the __middle __of__ a __battle. __Do __you __really __want__ to __talk __about __my __feelings __at __a __time __like__ this?_

_ . . . I guess not._

Nico retreated back to the stair door, and concentrated on keeping the flying snakes at bay again, also keeping half an eye on his friends, making sure that none of them needed assistance. But it wasn't long before the enemy had been driven back yet again, all the way to the far side of the roof.

Then Kwai joined the fight.

* * *

><p>Zia had sparred against Kwai in the past on several occasions. She'd been beaten every single time. Fire just wasn't a good match up against water. Even if their magic was equally strong, she would always be at a disadvantage. And Zia wasn't sure if their powers were equal, even with their elements aside.<p>

She tried to strike him down quickly, before he could defend himself, because that was the only way she could see herself winning this fight. Her stream of fire collided with a jet of water that Kwai aimed at her, and a deafening hiss was heard as their clashing powers created thick clouds of white steam that quickly rose skyward.

"You know Zia, there were rumors," Kwai called to her, his voice nasty and taunting. "They said you had become a godling. That you were host to Nephthys. But I knew those rumors were wrong. You? A host for Nephthys? Unthinkable. Fire affinity aside, you're simply too weak."

Zia summoned the largest fireball she could manage and flung it at Kwai, but he drowned it before it came anywhere near him.

"But you know, I had hoped it was true. I would have liked facing you if you were possessed by Nephthys. Imagine how much more feared I would be when people heard that Kwai of the Watery Death had defeated the river goddess herself!"

"I heard the half-mortal son of the sea god gave you enough trouble!" snapped Zia. "You set your sights too high if you think you can take on a goddess."

"If she was using you as a host, there would be nothing for me to worry about. You're that far below me."

"Don't get assume you've won this fight just because your element trumps my own," shouted Zia.

She flung her staff toward Kwai as hard as she could, and it began to change shape in midair.

"No cat will save you, however large, foolish girl!" Kwai summoned a high powered stream of water and blasted her creation just as it finished its transformation.

"It's not a cat," announced Zia, smirking as her hippopotamus charged Kwai.

Kwai's water slowed the hippo a bit, but not much. A lion or tiger, which were Zia's usual choices, would have been swept away in the deluge in a heartbeat, but her hippo continued charging straight through it and nearly succeeded in mauling Kwai.

He jumped aside at the last second and the hippo's momentum carried it off the roof. Zia sent another stream of flames Kwai's way, hoping they'd connect now that he was off balance. No luck. Kwai extinguished those flames just like all the ones before.

"Do you know what the problem is with magicians who are raised explicitly by the House of Life?" asked Kwai. "You lack creativity. The only way you know how to approach a problem is by using the same old spells and same old approaches that have been used for thousands of years. Your reactions are always the same. Even when you manage to pull off a trick, like the hippo one you just did, you are still entirely predictable. You follow up with your most reliable attack, whether it's suited to the situation or not."

"Stop talking as though the fight is over," said Zia angrily.

"But it is over," said Kwai. He gave her a nasty smile. "You have lost. Do you know why?"

"Tell me! Keep talking!" Zia tore off her charm bracelets and scattered them in an arc, in Kwai's general direction. "Give me more chances to get inside your guard!"

A small herd of five antelope sprang to life where each bracelet landed and charged the water magician from all different directions. Kwai didn't move to defend himself. For a moment Zia thought that she had one upped him, maybe even defeated him if her charms hit him hard enough. Three of the antelope reached him at once and smashed into him. Then they smashed through him, into each other, and ended up getting tangled up in each other's horns. The other two collided with them as well, and they all fell in a heap.

Kwai laughed and stepped forward, and Zia's jaw dropped in horror as she realized that her antelope had crashed through Kwai because he had somehow liquidified himself. The droplets that had splattered in different directions were now coming back together, reforming him. Mostly. His legs remained a blur. A very swelled up blur. In fact, all of Kwai seemed to be growing by the second, as his magic fed his form, creating more water to add to his body. If it could still be called a body. He was semi-transparent now too, and he began sludging his way toward Zia, a cruel smile on his ugly face.

Zia tried to blast that smile away, but only succeeded in creating a big gust of steam.

"If I were you, I would run, Zia," Kwai told her.

"What sort of freak are you?" screamed Zia. "What have you done to yourself, Kwai?"

"I've become one with my element. You have no idea how hard it was to learn this, how much I had to sacrifice. Most magicians would never dare tread the path I had to walk to get here. The few times I slipped, it caused quite a bit of disaster."

"The tsunami in the Indian Ocean –"

Kwai laughed. "That was the only one they caught me for. There were other times, I assure you. Hundreds more died for me to obtain this knowledge, but it was a sacrifice I was willing to make."

"You are disgusting!" Zia summoned a continuous stream of fire, the hottest she could manage, and kept it concentrated on Kwai for as long as she could. Never before had she deliberately attempted to kill another magician. Even with Aziza, she hadn't been going for the kill, knowing that Aziza was well shielded. But with Kwai it was different. All those people he had murdered for his own selfish pursuits, combined with the fact that he was now scarily powerful made him a target that had to be eliminated. Zia hoped that if she could keep her flames burning hot enough, long enough, she could completely evaporate the abomination Kwai had become.

She hoped in vain.

When at last she could keep her flames alive no longer, and slumped over, hands on her knees, panting, she watched in horror as the steam cleared to reveal Kwai still standing.

"My turn," said Kwai. And then he surged forward like a wave and crashed down over Zia. Zia felt herself be swept inside of him, and tried to escape, but found herself suspended, within him, able to move all her limbs, but unable to pull herself in any direction. She kicked and clawed, and tried to lash out with her magic, tried to evaporate him from the inside out, but it was all in vain. She was trapped.

_I__'__m __going __to __drown._ The thought sent fear through Zia and she redoubled her efforts to break free. She couldn't hold her breath much longer.

"They say that drowning is an extremely painful way of dying. Care to try it, Zia?" taunted Kwai.

Suddenly, Zia felt a disturbance in the water behind her. Then she felt two cold arms wrap around her waist, holding onto her tight. She thought that it was something Kwai was doing, some further way of tormenting her, and would have screamed in despair if she could open her mouth.

Then everything went dark. And cold. And Zia felt as though she was traveling at the speed of light. Then she was dropped onto the stone tiles of the roof, on the other side of the sphinx statue, a safe (or at least safe enough) distance away from Kwai.

She spit out the water that had gotten in her mouth, and coughed, then had to grab onto the sphinx statue because someone was clinging to her from behind for balance, and nearly pulled them both to the ground.

"Nico?" she asked hoarsely.

Nico made an exhausted sound, but also made an effort to stand on his own. He staggered up beside her, bracing himself against the stone sphinx as well.

"You have only gotten a reprieve, Zia," said Kwai. "And you, foolish demigod, have gotten yourself a watery death beside this traitor!"

"Whatever." Nico looked like a drowned wreck. His black hair looked like a tangled mess of brushstrokes painted in black ink, his skin so pale that it was nearly translucent, but his eyes burned with dark fire that was light-years beyond any flame Zia could summon. Maybe it was just her imagination, but the darkness looked like it was thickening around him. Zia wanted to step away from him. But at the same time she wanted to throw herself between him and Kwai, and shield him so that at least one of them would have a chance to escape.

"The youth of today are such fools," sneered Kwai. "If you were a son of your sea god, like the other, then you would be a problem. But you're not. Therefore, you are just barely worth killing –"

"Do you know what happens to those who underestimate the children of the Underworld?" asked Nico, his voice cold and brittle. "They die."

Suddenly the sphinx statue exploded beneath Nico's hands. At first, Zia thought that Kwai had attacked them somehow. She nearly tackled Nico to try to shield him, but then saw that the statue had exploded away from him and Zia, so that the pieces were angled toward Kwai.

"I know what the children of Hades are capable of, little boy!" shouted Kwai. "Summoning corpses and walking through shadows. Neither will save you from me!"

"You know nothing!" shouted Nico right back. The sphinx statue continued to crumble in front of him, into smaller and smaller pieces, collapsing down on itself, almost like it was dissolving. Zia stared in amazement, but confusion, as Nico's powers ground the stone into powder, that he propelled at Kwai. It sunk into his watery body like pigment.

"What exactly do you think you're doing?" asked Kwai, looking annoyed. His half-transparent face was now stained a brownish gold from the rock powder.

"Setting up an assist." Nico grinned, despite the exhaustion that was clearly written on his face. The stone tiles of the roof began turning to powder and flying toward Kwai too. "I'll let you in on a little secret before we kill you. The children of Hades have geo-kinetic powers too. Power over stone. And sand. And dirt . . . and do you know what you get when you mix dirt and water?"

"I know the answer! I know the answer! Call on me!" shouted Alyssa. Kwai was suddenly struck with a barrage of all the crumbled clay shabtis that had been destroyed on the roof thus far as the girl who was clearly following the path of Geb joined in the effort. "You get mud!"

"What are you doing?" shouted Kwai. "Stop that! What do you think you are doing?"

Kwai was no longer semi-transparent. And he could no longer hold his watery body together very well, probably because his watery body had turned into more of a mud body. If Zia didn't know better, she'd have thought that he'd gone rolling in the stuff.

Nico staggered and went down on one knee. Zia reached for him immediately, but he shrugged her off and pointed at Kwai. "Burn that bastard."

Then Zia understood. Hieroglyphics blazed all around her as she summoned a huge pillar of fire. She heard Kwai give one last, wretched scream, then the only sound on the roof was the roar of flames, as she baked Kwai's mud tainted body like a clay pot in a kiln.

When she released her flames and surveyed their work, she felt a surge of grim satisfaction. Kwai had been reduced to what looked like either a sorry excuse for modern art, or a child's first pottery project. For several seconds he continued to glow red like embers, an aftereffect of being overheated by Zia's flames. Then he started to crumble. Before their very eyes, he fell apart, cracking into hundreds of tiny pieces, with no hope of ever being fitted back together again.

Seeing their trump card's fate made the invaders retreat hastily once again, leaving the defending team triumphant for the second time that night.

"Nice job, guys," said Walt.

"Very nice," agreed Julian. "I thought we were in trouble for a minute."

"That was a really great idea, Nico," said Alyssa. She pumped her fist in the air in jubilation.

"Yes, it was, Nico – Nico!"

Nico was on his hands and knees. Zia hurried over to him and put a hand on one of his shoulders.

"Nico? Are you alright?"

"I need . . ." Nico whispered, barely managing to get the words out. "Need . . ."

"What?" asked Zia. "What do you need?"

Nico very slowly lifted his head, and Zia was shocked to see how quickly the fire had burnt out from his eyes now that the threat was gone. He stared at her, confused, like he didn't know who she was, then whispered one word before collapsing. "Nap."

Zia caught him and pulled him close in a hug. "Alright then. Sleep. You've earned it."

* * *

><p>AN: I won't be around this weekend, so next chap won't be posted until Mon at the earliest. I'm hoping to finish the battle by the end of next week. But that doesn't mean our heroes are going to have an easy time of it. There will be some injuries before Sadie and Carter return with Ra.<p> 


	12. Chapter 12

12

When the invaders got tired of beating their heads against the east wall and sent another force against the roof, they also sent a force of magicians against the terrace. This time Amos ordered the more advanced trainees into the fight.

Spells were flying everywhere, and Percy's mobility was greatly reduced, not because he was afraid of getting hit, but because he had to look before each swing of Riptide to make sure he didn't hit any trainees. They had found out some time ago that celestial bronze could hurt Egyptian magicians, and Percy didn't want to accidentally injure someone from his own side.

There were plenty of shabtis in the mix for Percy to hack apart. In fact, none of them got past him, so the trainees were able to focus on picking off the enemy magicians.

He could hear that the fight had begun again on the roof, but couldn't spare much attention to look toward it. He could hear the roar of flames and see the glow from Zia's flames cast over the fight on the deck. Then the sounds changed and he heard a noise like the hiss of steam. Then the roof fell silent.

He waited tensely, praying that he wouldn't hear the alarm from inside that meant the perimeter had been breached. That would mean that the enemy had gotten past the team on the roof, and the only way that would happen was if the entire roof team was dead.

Thankfully no alarm was sounded. But still, Percy couldn't help but worry. He couldn't help but remember the Battle of Manhattan, and how after he split up his troops to guard the separate entrances to the city, how he'd never seen so many of those campers again. And how so much time passed before he even learned who had died. He hated that feeling of dread and felt like it was eating him up inside.

Sadie and Carter had done a good job training their students, and for that Percy was glad. It took them about thirty minutes longer than the roof team had taken to drive off their invaders, but they managed to do it without anyone getting seriously hurt.

As soon as they'd wrapped things up, Percy left the clean-up to the others and hurried up to the roof. The moment he burst through the door at the top of the stairs, his heart nearly stopped when he saw Zia holding a very still, very pale Nico in her arms.

The world seemed to narrow down to include just the three of them, so he missed the relaxed expressions on the faces of the other teens on the roof.

"Is he . . ." Percy swallowed and moved closer. Then he saw that Nico's chest was rising and falling steadily.

"He's sleeping," said Zia. "He's not injured."

Finally, Percy was able to breathe again. "Thank the gods. You're all okay?" Now he glanced around at the others.

"We're all fine," said Walt. "None of us have worse than superficial injuries, like a few burns and scratches."

"Nico's been using his powers?" asked Percy. He moved to kneel beside Zia and Nico, trying to pretend that it wasn't weird finding someone who was essentially a stranger to them both, cradling his unconscious little cousin in her arms.

"Yes," said Zia.

"His powers drain him too much," said Percy. "I keep telling him not overdo it like this."

"If he hadn't, Zia probably would have died," said Walt hesitantly.

"He saved my life," agreed Zia.

"Kwai's dead, by the way," said Julian.

"We had to kill him," added Alyssa. "He would have killed us all if we didn't."

Percy noticed that her voice shook a little. Zia's face was shadowed too, he noticed as well. Walt and Julian didn't have that darkness on their faces, so he deduced that they hadn't had a direct hand in it, but Zia and Alyssa had. Possibly Nico as well. Probably Nico as well, come to think of it. But the difference was, it wasn't something that would bother Nico at all. These girls had just killed someone for the first time and they were feeling it. Percy couldn't help but feel momentarily guilty. If he'd finished off Kwai then they wouldn't have had to get their hands bloody.

"You did what you had to," Percy told them. "And you're right, if you hadn't done that, you would probably all be dead now."

Zia's grip on Nico tightened. Nico muttered something in his sleep but didn't wake. Percy watched warily as Zia pulled him tighter against her chest. He almost warned her that Nico was extremely averse to physical contact and wouldn't appreciate it if he woke up and found himself being smothered by her bosom, but saying something like that would have been too awkward.

"How long is it going to take Nico to recover from using his powers, Percy?" asked Julian. "I don't mean to sound insensitive, but we need him if they attack again."

"What exactly is he recovering from?" asked Percy. "Tell me everything you saw him do."

And so they told him about Nico using shadows to drive the uraei away from the roof, how he got set on fire twice (once by Zia by accident), how he used shadow travel to save Zia when Kwai turned himself into living water and tried to drown her inside of him, then how Nico had used his geo-kinetic powers to turn the stone sphinx statue and stone roof tiles into dust, that was used to turn Kwai into a mud-slide, so that Zia could roast him like a prize turkey.

By the end of it, Percy was very impressed. And more than a little worried. Nico really had been overdoing it, and from what he knew about Nico, this wasn't something he could bounce back from so easily.

Percy was hesitant to give him anymore nectar or ambrosia, since Nico had been pretty much living on that stuff for the past two weeks, and had to be close to his limit. The last thing Percy wanted was for him to burst into flames. Besides, they didn't have much left, and if Nico was injured they'd need to use it then.

"It's going to take awhile for him to recover from this," said Percy after considering it for a few moments. "I don't know if he's going to be able to control shadows again when he wakes up to keep the uraei at bay or not, but if he is capable of that, you need to do whatever you can to keep everything else away from him. But he's going to need a couple hours to recover, at the very least. I think . . . I think we should take him inside to let him get some uninterrupted rest. We'll send you a replacement for him –"

"One magician alone can't replace him," said Julian. "I'm not saying he doesn't need time to recover, but he's a very important part of our defense. We need at least two more people to hold the roof if he's out. Probably more like three."

"I'll see what I can do," Percy promised. He moved to take Nico from Zia.

Zia jerked Nico away from him and glared at him, leaning over Nico protectively. Percy blinked at her then raised an eyebrow. Zia didn't back down.

"Zia," he said, as politely as he could, "I would like to take my cousin inside. Please give him to me."

It was Zia's turn to blink. She looked surprised at herself as she realized what she was doing, then embarrassed. She started to hold him out toward Percy, but changed her mind at the last minute, right as Percy was about to lift him, and pulled Nico backwards roughly away from Percy. Amazingly, Nico remained asleep. His head actually flopped like a doll's and he groaned, but didn't wake.

Percy was starting to get annoyed. "Look, what is your problem?" he demanded. "Why do you keep staring at me like I'm some kind of monster, and what exactly do you think I'm going to do to Nico that he needs to be protected from? You think I'm going to eat him or something?"

Zia's face turned red and this time when Percy reached for Nico, she didn't yank him away. Which was good, because Percy would have grabbed Nico anyway, and a tug of war match might have ensued. Yeah, that would have been pretty bad.

"Sorry," muttered Zia. "I don't know what I was thinking."

Percy was careful to make sure that Nico's head was braced against his shoulder when he stood, because he didn't want his cousin getting whip-lash. He nodded to Zia and the others, then went inside and carried Nico down the stairs.

There was something about Zia that unsettled him a little bit, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. At first he'd thought it was because she was a fire magician, and water and fire didn't exactly mix . . . but Percy had no problems with anyone Greek who had any sort of fire powers, like that new kid Leo in the Hephaestus cabin, or Hephaestus himself. There was something about Zia that almost reminded him of a river nymph, or more like an echo of a river nymph. That didn't even make any sense in his own mind, but he didn't have time to worry about it now.

He took Nico down to his room, which he'd been to before on several occasions, but still found a bit disturbing, because Nico's room had been decorated by Anubis. It had a surreal feel to it, like the four walls were only an illusion, and the room really stretched on forever in every direction. And it was filled with macabre decorations, like gravestones and the kind of statues found in graveyards. Mist hunt in the air, and the only light came from an urn full of flames and some kind of illusionary moon. The bed looked like a sarcophagus, which made Percy feel creepy when he set Nico down on it.

Nico exhaled sharply then opened his eyes. He stared at Percy confused, like he wasn't sure who he was at first. Then he reached out and grabbed Percy's arm, so that he could pull himself into a sitting position. "What happened? What hit me?"

"Nothing hit you – Whoa!" Percy caught Nico as the smaller boy slumped forward.

"Oh, that's right. I remember now. We killed Kwai. Is Zia okay?" Nico's voice was barely more than a raspy whisper, and he couldn't even sit up on his own. More than that, he didn't even seem to realize that Percy was having to completely support him. Or when Percy pushed him back down so that he was lying down again.

"Zia's fine. Everyone's fine. The only injuries we've had so far have been a couple scrapes and burns. And you passing out from exhaustion."

"Did we win? Is it over?"

"Uh, no. It's about two o'clock. Maybe two-thirty. Just a few more hours to go."

"Gotta get up." And Nico made an attempt to.

Percy put a hand on his chest to hold him down, even though it wasn't at all necessary. Nico didn't even manage to lift his head this time. "Hey, no. You're out for awhile. You've been overusing your powers."

"I've got to fight, Percy."

"You can't fight. You can't even sit. You're too drained."

"I have to!" Nico grabbed onto Percy's arm again and tried to pull himself up again. This time he only managed to pull himself up about ten inches before his strength gave out and he fell back onto the bed.

"Nico, you've done your part," said Percy. "You need to rest now or you're going to end up in really bad shape."

"What else is new?" demanded Nico. "And where's my flask of nectar?"

"You're out," Percy told him. "Same with your ambrosia."

"Then give me some of yours. It's not like you need it anymore."

"You've already had too much, Nico," said Percy. "It's dangerous to give you anymore."

"I don't care. I need it. I need to get back in this fight, Percy!"

"I'm sorry, but –"

"Give it to me!" Nico clawed weakly at his arm. "Damn it Percy, fork it over now!"

Percy grabbed the younger boy's wrist to keep Nico from shredding his sleeve. "Nico, if I give you anymore there is a good chance that you will burn into ashes."

"I don't care!"

"Well _I_ care!" snapped Percy. "You're one of my best friends. You're pretty much my little brother. I'm not letting you burn yourself to a crisp for something so stupid!"

"It's not stupid! Percy, this is my home!" cried Nico.

Percy's come-back died in his throat.

"These people are my family. Even at Camp Half-Blood I'm not accepted as much as I am here. I never thought I'd find a place like this, but I have, and I can't lose it, Percy! I can't lose them. I have to do everything I can to defend this place and everyone in it, or I'm not going to be able to look at myself in the mirror."

Percy stared at his little cousin, taking note of the desperation on his face, and the tears in his eyes. Then he sighed and brought out his flask of nectar. He uncapped it and held it over Nico's mouth. Nico obediently opened his mouth, and Percy poured a small trickle down his throat. Not much. Maybe a teaspoon, a teaspoon and a half at the most.

"That's all I'm risking," Percy told him. "Unless you get seriously injured, you're not getting anymore tonight. Heck, you're not getting anymore for a month if I can help it. Understand?"

"Yes." Nico sat up, on his own this time. "Thank you, Percy."

"I want you to be careful," said Percy. "You know how dangerous this was, and you know how much strain you've put on yourself so far. So don't use your powers anymore than you absolutely have to, and don't repay me for this by getting yourself killed."

"I won't. The fight is mostly over, right? We only have to hold on for three and a half hours, right?"

"A lot can happen in three and a half hours," said Percy darkly. "I have a feeling that these freaks aren't going to give up so easily."

Percy didn't know how right he was.

* * *

><p>AN: Next chapter: the fight starts again and the east wall gets breached! Should be up on Wed or Thurs.<p> 


	13. Chapter 13

13

Zia had mixed feelings when Nico reappeared on the roof. She was relieved to see him awake and alert, but apprehensive about his state of health. He looked much better, yes, but considering how bad he'd looked a few minutes ago, she didn't think he had any business returning to battle.

"Alright, Nico's back," said Percy to the rest of them. "But he's nowhere near full strength, so watch his back."

Nico looked embarrassed when Percy put a protective hand on his shoulder. "I'm not that bad off –"

"Yes you are.

"Am not."

"Get your hands off him," growled Zia.

Percy and Nico both looked at her incredulously. Zia nearly covered her mouth in shock at her words.

"Zia, I'm sorry, but that's enough," said Walt.

"Seriously," agreed Julian.

"Sorry," muttered Zia. "I don't know what came over me."

"Why does everyone feel the need to be so overprotective of me?" Nico wondered out loud. "Is it because you think I'm young and helpless? Well I've got news for all of you! I was born in the 1930's! That makes me older than all of you combined!"

"Don't waste your energy shouting," Percy told him. "You're going to need it in battle. But for the record, Lotus Hotel time doesn't count and you know it."

"I say it does count. You should respect your elders and acknowledge that I'm always right."

Zia couldn't completely follow their exchange, and wasn't sure if Nico was being serious about having been born in the 1930's. She did, however, notice that Percy had not released Nico's shoulder when she'd ordered him to. He'd kept hold of it, probably to spite her, or at least show her that he didn't have to listen to her. Now he squeezed Nico's shoulder, then ruffled his hair like Nico was his little brother.

"Stay safe," he told Nico before turning to leave.

Zia also noticed that Nico seemed completely at ease with Percy. It almost looked like he tilted his head toward the older boy when he ruffled his hair, and his expression was genuinely affectionate when he bade him goodbye.

"You too, Percy."

Zia turned away, fighting the urge to throw something at Percy. Even knowing that her instincts were being influenced by Nephthys's instincts, she couldn't get past her dislike for the demigod. He made her skin crawl, and she couldn't help it, she wanted him away from Nico even though she knew that was wrong. They were cousins, after all. But . . . from what she remembered from her lessons, the children of Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades weren't supposed to get along any better than their fathers could.

But then, it wasn't like demigods were supposed to get along with Egyptian magicians either, but it seemed like Nico and Percy were doing fine at that too.

It was then that Zia realized that something was wrong with her own way of thinking. She hadn't thought about it too much earlier because there hadn't been time, or because she'd been distracted, but . . . why did she feel so protective of Nico?

There was absolutely no reason for it. She didn't know him. He was supposed to be an enemy, or at least someone she wasn't supposed to associate with. He was a cute kid, yes, but that didn't explain why Zia felt such a strong urge to protect him with everything she had. She almost felt like they had some kind of connection, like they were family. Could he be a relative of hers? She wondered, but didn't think it was likely. Well, it wasn't impossible. Maybe on his mortal side . . . but that was a really long shot, and even if it was true, they couldn't possibly be closer than second or third cousins. She felt like she saw Nico as more of a little brother . . . or more like a son.

_He__ couldn__'__t __be __hosting__ Anubis? __Could __he?_ Zia dismissed that idea almost immediately. That was completely ridiculous. Maybe it could have explained why she felt the way she did if it had been true, but there was no way it could be. Demigods couldn't host Egyptian gods. That was a well-known fact. Zia remembered from her studies how a war had nearly started after so many gods had attempted to take demigods as their hosts. It had been around the time when Egypt fell to Rome, and those demigods hadn't exactly been volunteers . . . in fact, they'd all been kidnapped. The Egyptians had gone to a lot of trouble to capture them, and it had been all for nothing. It hadn't worked a single time, ended up killing just about, if not all the demigods they attempted it on, and had nearly gotten the Greek/Roman pantheon directly involved in the war.

No, there was no way Nico could be a host to Anubis. Maybe . . . maybe Zia just had motherly sorts of feelings for him because he was so similar to Anubis. In her mind's eye, Zia could see the form that Anubis used when he was masquerading as human, and that form was strangely similar to how Nico looked. Yes, that was probably it. That and his death-related powers.

Thinking about that, Zia felt a little bit of concern for Nico. How would having powers related to death affect someone? She wondered if they hurt him, or affected him otherwise. Looking at him closely, she started to think that they did. Nico had Mediterranean features but extremely pale skin, almost like the pigment had been leached away. The lack of color made him look unhealthy, like he had no vitality. And he was so short. But that could be from malnourishment . . .

Zia stopped herself as she started to realize she was over-thinking this, when really she shouldn't have been thinking about it at all. Nico was none of her business. He meant nothing to her. Or at least, he was supposed to mean nothing to her. But Zia realized as she watched Nico wince as he sat, like his muscles were all aching, that this wasn't going to be so easy. She couldn't just turn these feelings off. She wasn't exactly happy about it, but it seemed like her protective streak was there to stay.

* * *

><p>When they attacked again, something felt different. It immediately put Nico on his guard. It felt like the invaders were holding back. Or like they were just trying to distract them. They only sent a couple magicians, and had them cower behind the air conditioning unit, flinging spells and shabtis, but not really making an effort to gain any ground. Their team didn't even include someone capable of controlling the flying snakes, so the uraei hovered around the building but didn't come down to join the fight.<p>

Nico didn't like this one bit. He knew he should be grateful for the reprieve, but it just made him wary. Zia and Walt took over the defenses, since they were the best at ranged magic. Alyssa and Julian who needed to be closer to be effective stayed back with Nico. In fact, they were very deliberate in staying between Nico and their enemies, which made Nico wonder what Percy had said to them while he'd been asleep.

"Does this seem wrong to any of you?" he asked after analyzing the way their enemies were attacking.

"What do you mean?" asked Alyssa.

"We've only got about two hours until dawn," he pointed out. "They know that we're expecting Ra to awaken then. And even if they're all counting on Apophis rising instead of Ra, they should still be getting desperate. Either we've got the king of gods on the way to smite them down, or they've got their uber-boss on the way, who won't be happy that they failed to kill a house full of children. No matter how you look at it, they shouldn't just be stalling like that."

"You're right," agreed Julian. "That is bad tactics. So you think they're planning something?"

"They must have something up their sleeve," said Nico.

"From the sounds of things, they're trying similar tactics on the terrace," said Zia. "Most of what I hear down there are shabtis being smashed. There are a few spells being cast and cancelled, but it's mainly fodder being broken apart down there."

"Do you mind if I go down and check with Percy about this?" asked Nico. "Those snakes aren't being controlled by the freaks behind the AC unit, and if you call for me I'll come running right back up."

"It's alright with me," said Walt. "I think we're alright up here."

"Go ahead," agreed Julian.

Zia looked conflicted. Nico fought the urge to glare at her.

"Alyssa, will you go with him?" asked Zia finally.

"I don't need an honor guard," said Nico.

"You look like you could fall down at any moment. I don't want you walking down all those stairs by yourself."

"What are you, my mom?" asked Nico, disgusted. Then he bit his tongue. That was not an idea he wanted to plant in Zia's head. No, he did not want her guessing that he was hosting Anubis because that would be bad.

Zia's head snapped up and she looked at him intensely. Nico actually took a few steps back from the force of her stare.

"I'm going," he announced, and hurried to do just that.

Alyssa tagged along with him, as per Zia's orders. Half-way down the stairs, Nico grabbed onto the rail and turned toward her.

"You don't have to follow me," he told her. "Like I said, I don't need an honor guard, and Zia's acting way over-protective when it comes to me for some reason."

Alyssa moved to stand beside him and offered him a smile. "Maybe I'm worried about you too."

Nico felt a strange burning sensation in his face. "I can take care of myself," he muttered.

"No one can take care of themselves all the time," said Alyssa. "Especially not when they're trying to take care of all their friends at the same time. That's why you have friends though, isn't it? So they can take care of you too?"

"Well . . . that's not the reason I became friends with you guys . . ."

"But it is one of the benefits," said Alyssa. "And it's also one of those things about friends: you put up with the good along with the annoying."

"I never said you were annoying," said Nico very quickly.

Alyssa just smiled. "Then I better try harder. Now come on. Let's go tell your cousin what you suspect."

They continued downstairs, but when they reached the last step Nico clung to the rail again. "Hold up, a sec. I just . . . need a minute."

"Take whatever time you need," said Alyssa.

"Hey!" Felix popped up, seemingly out of nowhere. "Did you beat those guys off our roof again? Do you need me to take the guys up there more junk food?"

"Not yet, Felix," said Alyssa. "We're working on it."

"Then what are you guys doing down here?" Felix wanted to know.

Nico opened his mouth to answer, but an explosion that shook the entire house cut him off, along with the sound of stones exploding and tumbling over each other. Nico nearly lost his balance. Alyssa did lose her balance and would have fallen, but Nico's demigod reflexes were thankfully still online, and he managed to catch her.

"The east wall!" she cried out. Then she raised her voice and shouted again. "The enemy has breached the east wall!"

Nico narrowed his eyes and drew his sword. "They're going to wish they hadn't when I'm through with them."

Then he sprinted toward the sight of the explosion. Strange as it sounded, the prospect of more battle, of being able to physically cut enemies down without resorting to magic and special attacks seemed to give Nico more strength. His blood felt like it was singing in his veins as he leapt over the huge pile of rubble and flung himself at the first magician who was foolish enough to venture into his home.

_These __idiots __really __should__ have __sent __in __a__ wave __of __fodder __for __their __first __assaul t__here,_ he thought as he severed an important tendon in each of the magician's arms before he even completed that sentence in his own mind. The magician's staff fell from suddenly limp fingers, and his arms fell uselessly to his sides. Nico gave him a very hard kick in the chest, and sent him flying back into one of his comrades.

_I__ don__'__t__ think __they __were __expecting __much __resistance,_ said Anubis. _They __thought __you __had __your__ best __fighters __on __the __roof __and __the __terrace._

_Bad __luck __for __them __that __I__ decided __to __come__ downstairs __just __now._ Nico smirked as he ducked under a sword swipe of one of those weird curved swords of the type that Carter favored. He came up inside the invader's guard and smashed the enemy's nose with his palm so hard that he swore he heard the cartilage splatter against the enemy's cheek. Then Nico rammed his sword-hilt into his jaw so hard that the bone cracked. The poor sap would be eating his meals through a straw for months to come.

_Bad __luck __.__.__.__ and __their __poor__ tactics,_ stated Anubis.

_Yeah,__ that__ too._

Nico could feel how sloppy his movements were. It was a sad testament to his enemies skills, or lack-there-of, that he was having such an easy time putting them in their place without even killing them. On the other hand, it was also his enemies' saving grace. If they'd been dangerous enough that Nico couldn't stop them so easily, he would have had to have dispatched them by killing them instead of merely disabling them. So he guessed that it evened out in the end.

_I __don__'__t __understand__ why __you __want __to __spare __them,_ said Anubis. _They __would __not __be __returning __the__ favor __if __they __had __the __upper__hand._

_I __know. __And__ believe __me, __I __wouldn__'__t __lose __sleep __if __I__ killed__ these__ freaks. __But __the __kids __here __really __don__'__t __need __to __see __so __much __death._

_Let __us __just __hope __that__ this __does __not __come __back __to __haunt __you._

Nico smirked tiredly. _I__'__m__ slicing __their__ tendons__ with __a__ Stygian __iron __blade. __You__ really __think __they__'__ll __be__ back __in __the __fight __any __time __this __year?_

_ Just be careful. You're in no shape to be fighting, let alone sparing your enemies._

Nico almost told him that he was fine and not to worry, but then he thought better of it. If he was honest with himself, he was a long way from fine. Even though he was still capable of holding back this invading force, pretty much on his own.

The other magicians from the reserve team joined the battle, like they'd been waiting for it all night. And honestly, they had. Nico smirked as he saw a penguin projectile peg one of their enemies in the head, followed by a rain of jagged ice shards. Felix was making his presence known. And he wasn't the only one.

A boy named Alan began sending spells flying every which way. Cleo, the oldest girl in their reserve team, began using words of power to incapacitate as many invaders as she could.

The invaders had expected to break through easily without much, if any resistance. They hadn't expected to face a bunch of battle-thirsty juveniles who'd been waiting all night for their chance to kick some butt, or a son of Hades whose natural hard-wiring for battle far exceeded their experience and skill.

They fell back quickly, under the defenders' fierce onslaught. Alyssa summoned her earth magic and used it to begin repairing the broken section of wall, right next to the doors, where the enemies had broken through. Nico considered helping her, but she looked like she could take care of it just fine, and using his geo-kinetic abilities again would probably put him out of the fight for the rest of the night, so he let her take care of it. When the invaders saw that, they full out retreated, abandoning the fight in their frantic need to stay alive, with all limbs still attached.

"That's right!" yelled Felix. "Run away! Run away! Begone, foolish noobs! You don't stand a chance against my leet-ness! Run away!"

Nico laughed, as much because of Felix's taunts as because he felt exalted, when the wall was sealed up behind them. Then, when he realized that the squirmish was over, he suddenly felt as if all his strength had abandoned him. The extra adrenaline that the battle had given him fizzled, and he almost took a nose-dive.

But he couldn't just break down right there and then. He was the senior warrior in the room. He had an obligation to his troops because of that.

"Is everyone okay?" he tried to ask, but his voice came out as a hoarse, unrecognizable rasp the first time he tried. He coughed, and licked his lips, then tried again. "Everyone okay? Are there any injuries?"

A few scrapes and bruises. Nothing major, and nothing that needed attention. Which was good, since their best healer was still comatose upstairs.

"Okay. Okay, good. Um . . . good job, everyone. Grab something with lots of sugar and caffeine to help recharge, but stay alert. I doubt they're smart enough to give up that easily."

"Hey look! Over here!" Felix had found something. That something was a seemingly unconscious enemy magician, half buried under a pile of stones. He poked the enemy magician with his wand, smirking at his enemy's plight.

But Nico's eyes zeroed in on the enemy's hands. "Felix, get away from him!" he shouted, and immediately sprinted forward.

Because the enemy magician's fingers weren't curled like they would have been if he was unconscious. They were lithe and alert, ready to grab a weapon at a moment's notice.

"But why?" asked Felix. "I –"

Then several things happened at once.

The enemy magician sprang to his feet, pulling a knife on Felix.

Felix froze in shock.

And Nico barreled right into Felix, determined to get the younger boy out of harm's way.

He felt a sickening, burning sensation in his stomach as he hit Felix like one pool ball slamming into another. Felix went flying and hit the ground hard, but Nico's momentum was canceled out, helped by the fact that he'd braced his feet upon collision, and pivoted. His Stygian iron blade slashed right through the enemy magician, and he killed the invader with one blow. He fell to the ground dead.

Then Nico fell over right on top of him.

_Nico!__ No!_ screamed Anubis in his mind.

Nico's next breath came in a rasping gasp, through clenched teeth, as his world exploded in pain. He tried to push himself off his enemy's corpse, but his arms wouldn't listen to him. He felt like his limbs had been turned to jelly, except there was no way being turned into jelly could be so painful. Everything hurt. Moving, breathing, thinking, everything.

He whimpered, and the sound was as pathetic as a tiny little kitten crying, helpless and alone, but Nico was in too much pain to even be embarrassed about a noise like that escaping his mouth.

_No,__ no, __no! _Anubis sounded frantic in his mind.

Someone grabbed Nico by the shoulder and rolled him onto his back, and Nico screamed. He couldn't help it. He hurt so much. Tears obscured his vision, but somehow he could tell that it was Alyssa bending over him. And somehow he knew what they were seeing.

The enemy magician's knife was embedded in his abdomen, right below his ribcage.

* * *

><p>Next Chapter:<p>

"_Don't touch me! Don't touch my blood!"_

"SOMEONE GET PERCY IN HERE!"

"**Don't die, Nico, okay? You can't die. Just . . . just hold on."**

"_They say . . . they say it's . . . always darkest just . . . before . . . dawn . . . That should . . . be a good thing . . . right?"_

"I'm sorry. There's no way to save him. There's nothing we can do."


	14. Chapter 14

14

"Oh gods . . ."

Nico recovered enough presence of mind when he saw Alyssa reaching for his wound to realize that would not be good. He flung his arms up in front of him, weakly blocking her aid, trying to fend her away from him.

"Don't touch me!" he screamed, his voice shrill with pain. _"__Don__'__t__ touch __my __blood!__"_

"Nico, calm down!" Alyssa grabbed his hands, which wasn't really necessary, because Nico couldn't have done more. "Shh, shh, easy . . . Gods . . . Someone get Percy in here!"

"Alyssa . . . get . . . back," Nico tried to warn her. "Not safe. Don't . . . touch my . . . blood!" Then he screamed in pain and would have curled in on himself, but his muscles weren't obeying him. It just hurt so much. Worse than anything except the times when he or Anubis had tried to pull his heart scarab out of his chest, and then that pain had only come in a flash, then it had been over with. This pain wouldn't go away.

"Shh, you're going to be okay," said Alyssa.

"Don't touch . . . don't touch . . . blood . . . don't . . ."

"I don't understand. What . . .? Your blood," Alyssa seemed to have finally seen what Nico was afraid of. "It's . . . black."

"Don't . . . touch! Bad . . . power . . . Please . . . stay . . . back . . ."

"Okay, I won't touch you . . . But I can't just leave you alone," said Alyssa. "Hang on. Percy's on his way."

Nico groaned and closed his eyes. He could hear Anubis murmuring prayers to other gods for healing in his mind, and Alyssa making soothing sounds, but it all ran together, and was drowned out by his pain. It seemed like a very long time, but was probably only a few minutes before Percy arrived, and broke through the haze that was obscuring Nico's entire world.

He felt a warm hand on his forehead, then another near his wound, and his eyes flew open again, as he tried to warn whoever was trying to help him. "Don't . . . touch . . . blood . . ."

"It's okay, I know," said Percy. His face was grave and worried, but his presence made Nico feel a little better anyway, even though he was in just as much pain as ever.

They had decided after learning the effects that Nico's blood had on other humans and demigods, that Percy should avoid contact with it if at all possible. His curse of Achilles might protect him, but they'd already learned that Nico's blood could dissolve Egyptian protective enchantments, and didn't see any reason to tempt the Greek Fates. So Percy was very careful as he cut away the part of Nico's shirt around his wound, that had already been eaten away by his corrosive blood.

"I'm going to pull the blade out," warned Percy.

"Are you sure you should do that?" asked Felix. "I've seen stuff like this on TV! They say in some cases it's better to leave whatever injured them in, until they're in the hospital."

"No hospital," rasped Nico. "Can't . . ."

"Nico can't be taken to a hospital," said Percy. "His blood causes spontaneous decay. Any doctor trying to work on him would probably die. Now all of you, get back."

Percy seemed to have an ample amount of gauze on hand, Nico noted in the seconds before his world flared up in even more pain, when Percy pulled the dagger out of his abdomen. Nico screamed and clawed at the air, then sobbed when Percy pressed a heap bandages over the wound, trying to stem the flow of blood. He dropped the dagger, or what was left of it, into a bucket that someone must have brought when Nico wasn't paying attention. But Nico was able to get a glimpse of the dagger. It looked like it had been dipped in a vat of chemicals specifically designed to eat metal. The edges had been corroded away, and there were holes burned through the center. The tip of it was actually missing. Under normal circumstances, that would have been a terrible thing, because it would have needed to be removed, but in this case, Nico's black blood would simply finish it off, melting it to nothing inside the wound.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Percy said as Nico continued to scream in pain. "I'm sorry, Nico, I know it hurts. Just hang on, okay? The worst is almost over . . ."

"Please stop!" Nico screamed, and tried to claw at Percy. He tried to grab his wrists and stop him from applying pressure because it felt like it was burning him alive. "Percy, stop! Please!"

"I'm sorry . . ."

"Stop! Gods! Stop!"

"Just hang on –"

"Someone help me! Bianca! _Bianca, __help __me!__"_ Nico was out of his mind with pain. Otherwise he would have never screamed for his dead sister, who he knew very well could do nothing for him. "Someone! Help!"

Percy looked like he was crying now too, but he didn't relent. He added another fistful of bandages to what he was using to apply pressure now, when what he was already using was eaten away by Nico's blood. "I'm sorry," he said again, his voice breaking.

"Anubis! Help me! Father!"

"What are you doing to him, you filthy sea-god scum?" screamed a familiar voice that cut right through to Nico's consciousness like it had a direct line. "Get away from him right now!"

Nico stopped screaming for a second, caught up in disbelief. "Mama?" he asked hoarsely to no one in particular.

Anger flashed across Percy's face, and he barely glanced at Zia. "I don't have time for your idiocies right now, Zia!" he shouted. "You stay back and let me treat him!"

Nico barely heard what Percy said, and didn't understand what he did hear. What was Percy talking about? Who was Zia? And how, how, _how_ had his mother gotten into Brooklyn House? Was it because he was dying? Was she coming to get him?

"Mama?" he called out to her.

In his mind he heard a very sad voice. _Nico__.__.__. __I__'__m __sorry_.

"What?" Nico didn't understand.

_I__'__m__ going__ to __have __to __take __control. __Otherwise__ Percy __and __Zia __might __come __to __blows._

"Huh?" Nico started to ask, but suddenly his mouth stopped working.

"Zia, stop," he heard himself say. "Percy is . . . doing . . . his best to help . . . me."

It took him several long moments to realize that it was Anubis who was in charge now, even though the god had told him what he was about to do in as many words. And it seemed like the god was having just as hard a time of talking through the pain as Nico was.

Suddenly Zia was right beside him, smoothing down his hair, her face so worried that it nearly broke Nico's heart. Doubly so when he realized how confused he'd been. Zia wasn't his mother. He wasn't her son. She might be looking at him with love and worry, but those feelings were fake.

Percy looked down at him with surprise, then understanding seemed to cross his face. He went back to tending Nico's wound, taking advantage of Anubis's control.

Zia, on the other hand, seemed to draw close to having a meltdown. "Don't die, Nico, okay?" she said, looking almost panicked. "You can't die. Just . . . just hold on."

Anubis must have felt too awkward to speak, so he merely inclined Nico's head slightly, in what could be considered a nod.

"Alyssa, I'm sorry, but could you go back up to the roof," said Percy. "If Zia and Nico are both down here, Julian and Walt will be in trouble if they attack again."

"Right. Sure." Alyssa looked very worried, but obeyed Percy's request, pausing only to touch Nico's hand for a second. "Be strong, Nico," she whispered. "Don't give up on us, you hear?"

Anubis gave another slight nod.

_Hey __Anubis?_ Nico had a hard time concentrating enough to string his thoughts together coherently, but Anubis seemed to understand him anyway.

_Yes, __Nico?_

_ It hurts. A lot. Is it . . . is it as bad as it feels?_

Anubis was silent.

_Am __I __going__ to __die?_ The question sounded so pathetic, even though it wasn't voiced out loud, but Nico was in too much pain to care.

_I__ think__ so,_ said Anubis. His mental voice was thick with regret. _The __wound __is __in __a __bad__ place._

_Wh-what__'__s __going__ to __happen __to __my __soul, __do __you __think?_ Nico wondered. _Am __I__ going __to__ be__ sent__ to__ my__ father__'__s __realm?__ Or__ since __I__'__m__ fused __with __you,__ am __I__ going__ to__ get__ sucked__ back__ to__ the__ Duat __to__ have __my__ heart __weighed?_

_ I__ don__'__t__ know,_ admitted Anubis.

_Oh__.__.__.__ but __I__ don__'__t __even __have __a__ heart __now.__ I __forgot. __But __there__'__s __no __way __that __stone__ scarab __weighs __less __than __a __feather.__ So __is __Ammit __going __to __eat __me?_

_ I __wish __I__ had __answers __for __you,_ said Anubis. _But __I __promise__.__.__.__ if __you__'__re __drawn__ back __to __the __Duat, __and __fall __under __my __jurisdiction, __you__ needn__'__t __fear __the __future.__ I__ promise __I__'__ll __take __care __of __you._

_ What__'__s__ going __to __happen __when __my __father __finds __out?_ wondered Nico. _Oh __no, __he__'__s __not __going __to __like __this. __He__'__s __going__ to __be __so __disappointed __in __me__.__.__.__ and __he __might __blame__ you. __This __is __bad__.__.__._

_ Try not to worry about it. Worrying really won't help anything._

_ I__'__m__ scared,_admitted Nico.

_I__'__m__ sorry. __I __never __meant __to __bring__ this __fate __down __on __you._

They were silent as Percy tended to Nico's wound as best as he could. It seemed like he finally managed to get the bleeding to stop, then he poured half of his remaining nectar into the wound, and the other half down Nico's throat. Nico was only partly aware of what was happening. Pain still dulled all of his senses and kept his mind half removed from what was going on around him. He was partly aware when Bast and Amos came in to check on what was happening, and he heard their grim conversation when they saw where his wound was located, and what they had to say when Percy asked them for help.

"I'm sorry. There's no way to save him. There's nothing we can do."

Zia got into an argument with them, demanding to know who their best healer was, and why she wasn't trying to help them. Percy tried to contact the Apollo Cabin via an Iris message, despite the fact that he and Nico had never wanted the other demigods to know about their connection with the Egyptians. Unfortunately, it didn't seem like there was anything capable of being used for IM reception in the Apollo cabin, and he wasn't able to get through.

"There is only one thing I can think of that could possibly save him now," said Amos, when everything else had already been tried.

"What?" demanded Percy and Zia in unison. Both looked like they were ready to jump up and strangle Amos if he didn't answer quickly enough.

"In the oldest legends recorded by the House of Life, there are tales of Ra's power restoring his allies with each coming dawn," said Amos. "All injuries received by his comrades who guarded him on his ship, or his vassals who fought chaos in this world, in his absence, would be healed upon his rebirth each morning. If this bit of lore is true . . ."

"Then Nico might be healed if Sadie and Carter succeed," breathed Zia. She squeezed Nico's hand and her eyes sparkled with hope. "You hear that, Nico? Just . . . just hold on until day-break and you'll be healed."

"We do not know if that legend is true or not –" started Amos.

"It is," said Bast. She too looked more hopeful now. "I had forgotten about it, it was so long ago, but there is truth in that legend. Ra's powers restored those of us who fought for him. But Nico . . . I can't say for sure that it will work for Greeks."

"It will," insisted Zia. "It has too."

"And Nico's not exactly your ordinary Greek," Percy reminded them. "He . . . you know . . . uses Egyptian magic too, and stuff." He wisely didn't announce that Nico was hosting Anubis, but it was clear to everyone who already knew that was what he meant.

"It's only a little over an hour until the sun rises," said Percy. "Then we'll know if Sadie and Carter have succeeded. Hold on until then, Nico. Please. You have to."

Nico was still in more pain than he had words to describe, but he had no intentions of giving up. Certainly not without a fight. He gave Anubis a mental nudge, signifying that he wanted control back, then spoke when the god obliged. "They say . . . they say it's . . . always darkest just . . . before . . . dawn . . . That should . . . be a good thing . . . right?"

"What do you mean?" Bast asked.

"Don't make him talk!" snapped Zia. "Save your strength, Nico."

"He means that he draws strength from the darkness," explained Percy so that Nico wouldn't have to. "He means that he's not going to give up."

"Yes," agreed Nico. That one word was the most he could manage. He wanted to close his eyes, but he knew that if he did that, he might never open them again. If he fell asleep, he probably wouldn't wake up. And he wanted to live. More than anything, despite how much it hurt, he wanted to live.

* * *

><p>AN: To answer a question that a couple people asked: no, I did not have this chapter written when I posted the last cliffhanger one. I just finished it a few min ago. I follow the philosophy of Heather Fleming when it comes to releasing things (even though she's a mighty real writer, and I'm failing at even getting my short stories accepted to magazines) that if it's written, there's no reason to make your readers wait for it. I was only able to write that preview with the quotes because I had some ideas of what I wanted people to say in this chapter. And it still turned out to be kind of hard to fit all of them in, even though it was kind of fun. I'll probably do previews like that again when I can, but right now I'm not sure what the characters are going to be saying next chapter.<p>

But the battle is almost over (yay!) and victory will soon be at hand (yay again!) I will try to post the next chapter tomorrow, but it might be kind of short. I'm staying over at a friend's house tonight with the other girls who I've been role-playing with, and I won't get back until tomorrow. We're starting a new campaign tonight, still based off of Mortal Instruments, but in an AU where Valentine actually did use the Mortal Cup to create a child army, and it's going to be sick. Not as sick as weasels, but still sick. So look for the next update tomorrow.

-Asilda


	15. Chapter 15

15

Walking away from Nico and returning to the battle was one of the hardest things Zia had ever had to do. And she could tell just by looking at Percy that he felt the same way, even though she still didn't like the sea god's son.

They couldn't leave him where he was, since the east wall might be breached again, so Percy carried Nico to the infirmary, despite Nico's protests that he wanted to go to his room.

"You're too used to your room," Percy told him. "You might fall asleep there. And if you fall asleep . . ."

He'd probably never wake up.

There was only one other person in the infirmary: a girl who seemed to be in a coma. Percy put Nico in the bed next to hers, then cranked it up so that Nico was sitting, so that he'd be less likely to fall asleep.

"Here," said Percy, holding a can of something to Nico's lips. "Drink this. All of it."

"What are you giving him?" demanded Zia. "Is that more of that nectar substance?"

"No . . . it's Red Bull," said Percy.

"Gives you . . . wings," muttered Nico. He tried to take a sip, but Percy tilted the can too far, and Nico ended up spluttering the beverage.

Zia fought down the urge to brain Percy with a bed-pan and started opening drawers until she found one with bending straws. She yanked the can away from Percy and put the straw into it before offering it back to Nico. "You'd think you were trying to drown him, sea god spawn," she muttered.

As Nico drank his Red Bull, the sounds of battle reached their ears, and they knew that they were under attack again.

"Go," Nico told them, as Zia and Percy looked at each other, then down at him.

"I don't want to leave you alone," said Percy. "If something happens to you here, there'll be no one to help you –"

"There's nothing . . . they could . . . do anyway," said Nico. And that was the truth, however grim it was, and hearing it still made Zia's heart feel like it was in a vice.

Percy knelt down so that he was at eye level with Nico. "Hold on, okay? Don't you give up on me, cousin. I've come too far for you to just bow out now."

Nico reached for him weakly and they clasped hands. "I'll . . . hold on. I promise."

When they released their hands, Zia noticed that both of them had white knuckles. She stepped forward and gave Nico a quick kiss on the forehead, before she could think better of it. "Hold on," she echoed what Percy had said, then quickly turned away before she could see what his reaction would be.

She fled from the room, but every step seemed harder to take than the last. More than anything she wanted to stay . . . but she knew that she couldn't. She and Percy were both needed elsewhere.

* * *

><p>Staying conscience was harder than Nico thought it would be, considering how much pain he was in, and how Percy had left him so that he was sitting up-right. Thankfully, Anubis was in his head and wouldn't let him sleep. Whenever he started getting too drowsy, the jackal god started shouting at him, causing a racket that only Nico could hear, and jolting him back into awareness.<p>

He tried to make sense of the other sounds that he was physically able to hear. Magic explosions and the roar of flames and waves kept reaching his ears, but it was impossible to tell what was going on just by that. The most he could gather was that the defenders seemed to still be holding their own.

_How__ much__ longer?_ he asked Anubis for what must have been the tenth time since Percy and Zia left.

_Not__ much__ longer,_ answered Anubis. _Just__ hold__ on._

_ Hurts._

And in all honesty, Nico didn't know how much longer he could hold on. His grip on consciousness kept getting weaker and weaker. Anubis kept having to shout louder and longer in his mind to rouse him again. Nico tilted his head to look at his neighbor in the next bed. Jaz had it easy, nice and peaceful in her coma. He definitely got the short straw, with a knife in his stomach and an annoying god in his head.

_I __heard__ that._

_Leave__ me __alone._ Nico's eyelids felt like they were weighted. Surely it wouldn't hurt just to close them for a second?

_You __are __not __going __to __sleep,__ Nico! __Keep __your __eyes __open, __you__ little __noob!_

_ I'm not a noob . . ._

_ Damn__ it, __Nico! __Wake__ the __hells __up!_ shouted Anubis. _Your__ cousin __is __depending __on __you! __Do __you __want __to __let __Percy __down?_

_No__.__.__._ Reluctantly, Nico opened his eyes again and coughed. Pain wracked through his entire body. _Can__'__t __do __this __much __longer, __Anubis._

_ You can._

_ Can't. Sorry._

_ You won't have to do this much longer. It's nearly dawn._

_ How much longer?_

_ Not long._

Nico telepathed his disbelief in that statement.

_I__'__m __not __lying.__ It__ will __be__ any __minute __now, __Nico. __Just __hang __on!_

An explosion rocked the building, and Nico heard stones breaking. _They__'__ve __breached__ the __east __wall __again__.__.__._

_ What do you think you're doing? _

_ Getting up. Going to fight._

Nico managed to swing his legs over the side of his bed.

_No!__ Nico, __get __back __in __bed! __You__'__re __in __no __shape__ –_

_ I'm not going to die lying down in bed. _

_ If you try to fight you are definitely going to die! That's assuming you can even get down the stairs!_

Nico cried out in pain as his feet hit the floor, and he nearly fell. _I__'__m __going __to __drift __off __if __I__ stay__ here!_

He waited for Anubis to protest again, and felt a surge of surprise when no protest came. Grimacing, he forced himself to stand on his own, without the support of the bed. Maybe it was his imagination, but the pain seemed to be receding.

Then he realized . . . the surprise he'd felt wasn't just his own. It was Anubis's too. And the pain really was going away . . .

Nico reached down and pulled away the bandages Percy had put on his stomach, and found that his wound was gone. Pale, unmarked skin was all that was there. Not even a scar to show he'd ever been injured to begin with.

"Ra . . ." he whispered out loud, forgetting himself. "Sadie and Carter are back? They succeeded?"

"They must have," said a familiar voice from the next bed over.

"Jaz!" Nico abruptly forgot he'd ever been injured and hurried to her side. "You're alright!"

"Yeah. So are you." Jaz gave him a sunny smile.

"Are you up for a fight? Because we're under attack. The House of Life –"

Jaz held up a hand to stop Nico. "I've been dreaming. I'm up to date with what's going on. And I'm ready for my turn to kick some butt."

Nico felt a violent grin start to spread across his face. "Well then, let's go!"

He held out a hand to help Jaz off the bed, then pulled out his switchblade and hit the button, turning it into sword form. Then he started sprinting toward the door.

It was like the past two weeks, or however long he'd been gone had never happened. Nico felt better than he had in a long time. He felt strong enough to run a marathon, or single handedly kick the crap out of every single House of Life freak threatening his home. And he felt warm, like there was sunshine in his veins instead of corrosive black poison. He felt _good_.

_Don__'__t__ get __over confident,_ warned Anubis. _If __you __get __injured__ again__ –_

_ I won't! And if I don't hurry up, there's not going to be any enemies left! Because if everyone else on our side received Ra's blessing, like Jaz and I just did . . ._

Nico skidded into the Great Hall and saw that finishing his sentence was completely unnecessary. Nope. There was no 'if' about it.

"Hurry up, Jaz!" he shouted back to her, because she hadn't been able to keep up with his demigod speed. "Before all the good enemies are taken!"

"I'm coming, I'm coming! Wait, what are you doing, Nico? Why are you on top of the rail?" demanded Jaz as she sprinted into the hall.

Nico spared only a second to shrug and answer her. "Because it's the fastest way down," he said. Then he jumped off the rail. It was high time he rejoined the party.

* * *

><p>AN: Yay! It's a miracle! And yeah, I know that whatever happened to them probably isn't really called Ra's blessing, or a blessing of Ra, but I think that's probably a term Nico would think to give it since he didn't know what else to call it, and since that term is used commonly in the Percy Jackson books.<p>

And I just found out that Disney set a release date for the Sea of Monsters movie . . . but in March 2013! Agh! But I also found out that the guy who plays Percy plays one of the musketeers in the new Three Musketeers movie, so now I want to see that too.

Next chapter will probably be ready on Monday, Tues at the latest. And it will have major spoilers for Throne of Fire, since it's a different viewpoint of that climactic scene in the book . . . but anyone worried about spoilers shouldn't have read this far to begin with, so it's probably not a big issue, lol.


	16. Chapter 16

16

The battle was a scene of glorious chaos. The good kind of chaos, like what happens at festivals and Mardi Gras, not the evil destroy-the-world kind of chaos that Apophis was trying to bring about. Nico's housemates were kicking butt in every direction he turned. None of his friends seemed to be in dire straights, and no one seemed to need help more than anyone else, so Nico simply jumped in.

He could see Percy and Bast holding the deck by themselves. The rest of the deck defense team, and the reserve team were both tearing into the invaders, along with Alyssa and Julian who must have come down from the roof to help. Zia and Walt were more than likely okay on the roof on their own, since Ra's blessings would have restored their magic. And Sadie and Carter would be getting back any minute!  
>"Life is good," announced Nico to the first magician he came across. Then he slashed his sword through one of the tendons in the man's left leg and trampled over him as he sought out his next enemy. "Don't you think?" he called back.<p>

"Nico! You're okay!" Felix looked delighted as he directed his penguins to charge down their enemies.

"Yeah! I feel great!" Nico moved to intercept an enemy who had singled out Felix. He kicked her in the knee as hard as he could and felt her knee-cap break beneath his foot. "Jaz is awake too! Ra's blessing got us back on our feet! Unlike this witch who's on her knees right here!"

Felix cheered and summoned more penguins. Nico squinted against the radiance as Felix's target conjured some kind of protective circle and stared screaming, "No, please no!"

Nico and Felix exchanged glances.

"What's up with him?" asked Nico as he casually cut down another one of their enemies.

"I have no idea. All I did was sic some penguins on him."

"Well," Nico stepped fast to dodge a magician who was being ridden around by Khufu the baboon, "that's . . . interesting. But I guess if he'd rather cower in there than fight, he's smarter than his comrades."

"Not Antarctica again! Please no! Anything but that!"

Every direction Nico turned, the House of Life freaks were getting their butts whooped. He was actually hard pressed to find enemies to cut down now and had to settle for reducing a few shabtis into dust.

"No more penguins! No more snow! Please! Please no!"

"That could get annoying," muttered Nico. He tried to make his way toward the terrace, to get Percy's attention, and let him know that he was okay, but the glow of flames caught his attention. He saw Aziza battling it out with Amos and redirected his course toward them.

_Careful,_ warned Anubis.

_Tell__ her __to __be __careful. __This __time__ I __kill __that__.__.__. __never__mind__.__.__._ Nico trailed off disappointedly as he saw Amos sink Aziza into the marble floor so that only her head was visible. _I__ can__'__t __kill __someone__ who __just __got __beaten __by __someone __else, __even __if __they __do __deserve __it._

"Not Antarctica again! Anything but that!"

"Shut up, will you?" snapped Nico.

"Easy there, Death Boy. Don't burst a blood vessel."

"Sadie!" Nico grinned. "Thank the gods."

"Thanks for holding down the fort," she said, grinning at him so radiantly Nico would have sworn she was a battle goddess right there. She didn't look like she'd been trudging through the Duat all night, and running all over the world looking for pieces of scrolls for days before that. She looked perfect right then, the red streaks in her blond hair perfectly complimenting her sun-kissed skin. She looked like she was glowing.

"I . . . uh . . . yeah. It's cool."

_Focus, __Nico._ Anubis did not sound pleased.

_Right.__ Sorry._

"I mean: Let's finish this up then go for McDonalds!" said Nico, and dove back into the fight alongside Sadie.

Not even minutes, but seconds later the fight was pretty much over. All the shabtis and demons had been dusted, and the enemy magicians were scrambling to retreat. One of them opened a portal and the others started mobbing toward it.

"That's right, noobs! Run away!" shouted Felix.

But Sadie didn't allow them to flee right then. She summoned some sort of solar wind that swept through the room, knocking all their enemies to the ground but leaving all their allies standing. When Nico looked toward her his jaw dropped. Shimmering rainbow wings framed her on either side. And when he'd thought she was glowing before, that was only a figure of speech. Now she quite literally glowed with holy light. The sight was enough to make Nico feel like he should be dropping to his knees and kneeling before her.

_She __looks__ like __an __angel,_ he told Anubis.

_Yes, __she __does, __but __why __are __you __on __your __knees?_

Nico blinked, realizing that he had indeed knelt before Sadie's awesomeness, the same as he would have if she were a goddess. _Force __of __habit?_ he suggested.

He listened as Sadie explained what had happened in the Duat, how Ra had been restored, and how some Russian dude turned out to be a traitor, and how Desjardins was now dead. Once she was finished an argument broke out. Something about a leopard skin cape, that made the invading magicians start trying to insult the Kanes. Nico was on the verge of storming over there and slamming his fist into their faces until they shut up, but a hand on his arm stopped him. Percy shook his head and gave him a warning look, and Nico understood. And agreed when he thought about it rationally. This was an Egyptian affair. Something they had to resolve for themselves. Even though Nico was hosting Anubis, and was therefore one of them, they didn't know that and would see him as an outsider interfering.

"Sorry," whispered Percy, "but we have to let them deal with it."

"No, you're right," Nico whispered back.

Percy smiled. "I'm glad to see you're alright. You have no idea how glad."

"Sorry I worried you, cousin."

Percy slung an arm around his shoulders affectionately. But that affectionate gesture seemed to turn sort of protective, maybe even slightly possessive when Zia and Walt touched down on the terrace with Ra in his boat, then jumped off before he could rise into the heavens, accompanied by Bast.

There was a little more talk before the other magicians left, freeing Aziza from the floor and taking her with them. Aziza looked back toward Nico and locked eyes with him before she stepped through the portal. Then she mouthed a promise to him.

_Next__ time,__ pet._

Nico tightened his hand on his sword-hilt. Then he stuck out his tongue at her and made a face. Not the most mature of responses, but it felt like the right thing to do. Judging by her sour expression, as she turned away, it was probably the best way he could have annoyed her.

"Don't forget, you're not alone," said Percy, feeling how tense Nico had grown.

"Like you'd let me forget," teased Nico. The comment fell a little flat, but he could tell Percy got the message. Nico was still afraid of Aziza, but he wasn't petrified of her now. When the time came, he would deal with her.

Zia came over to them, then hesitated a few yards back. She gave Percy a look that actually made Nico feel a little bit afraid for his cousin. The way she was glaring at him made him feel like she was planning on lobbing moltav cocktails at him, or poisoning him with something really nasty. Then Nico looked at Percy and wondered if maybe it should be Zia he was afraid for, because Percy was looking at her the same way he looked at monsters that needed to be cut down.

"Hey, you guys did see we won, right?" he asked, trying to break the ice. "We're all friends here now, right? Right?"

Zia moved her eyes toward him, and then they softened and she smiled. "I'm glad you are okay. I was . . . very worried."

Nico felt the urge to give her a hug, and started to push it back. Then realized that he didn't want to. He carefully detached himself from Percy's protective hold, then embraced Zia carefully, in case she'd been injured, or suddenly decided she didn't want him around her.

"Umm . . . you guys . . . are you . . . do you know each other?" Carter was suddenly there, looking at them oddly.

"Uh . . ." Nico quickly jumped back from Zia, not sure what to say.

"Nico is a very brave young man. He was badly injured earlier. I was worried about him," said Zia defensively.

"Uh, right." Carter gave Nico a strange look that Nico couldn't quite read. "Uh . . . there don't seem to be any injuries now, but there's a lot that needs to be cleaned up."

"And we should keep the guard up too," said Percy. "Your chaos snake might send something to attack you. Or our friends who just left might come back."

"Oh yeah. That too." Carter looked flustered.

"I'll help with the watch, since I don't have any magic," said Percy. "And Ra's blessing or no, I think Nico better join me. I don't want you draining yourself with magic on top of everything else that you've done to yourself the past two weeks."

Nico shrugged in agreement. "My hi-nehm spells suck anyway."

_It__ is __better __not __to __tempt __fate,_ agreed Anubis.

"Umm," Nico looked around. "But first . . . before we start cleaning up . . . do you think we could get some breakfast?"

* * *

><p>AN: You can always trust Nico to focus in on the important things, lol. This story is getting close to finished. Only one or two more chapters. If it's only one then at least it will be a long one. Then I'm taking a break for a little while, lol. Writing this much is fun but hard and I don't know how real authors do it. I've also got a bunch of tests and projects coming due before Thanksgiving, then again the week before Christmas, so I won't have time to write like this for awhile.<p>

After that, I'll probably write a couple short stories set in this AU before the next big fic. You guys have asked for stories about how Nico meets the different trainees, so I want to try that out. And I also want to do another one where Nico runs into Jason again. I also have to figure something out for Hazel. If future stories give spoilers for SoN, I'll put plenty of notice in beforehand, so no one will have to worry about that.

Next chapter will be up Wed or Thurs.


	17. Chapter 17

17

Breakfast was nice. It was the first time that they hadn't had to worry about the end of the world in weeks. Nico was able to catch up with Sadie and Carter and explain to them why he'd been missing so long.

"Well, I'm glad things turned out okay," said Carter once he was finished. "We knew something was wrong when we didn't hear from you after the first few days."

Sadie punched him affectionately, but hard enough to raise a bruise on Nico's arm. "Worry me like that again and you'll be sorry, Death Boy."

"Sorry," muttered Nico, rubbing his bruised arm. He did feel bad about making them anxious, and it still seemed like a novelty to have people care about whether or not he was okay.

"Stop threatening him and beating him, Sadie," said Carter. "Our whole plan would have fallen through without him and Anubis."

"What about Anubis?"

Everyone cringed as Zia approached. There was suspicion in her golden eyes that made Nico feel like he'd definitely done something wrong and was about to get scolded for it.

"Nothing," said Percy, bristling at the very sight of Zia. "Why?"

"I wasn't talking to you, sea god spawn."

"What's your problem, anyway?" demanded Percy.

Zia looked like she was going to insult Percy again. Then she bit her tongue and blushed. "I . . . I apologize. While I was sleeping these past few months, and hosting Nephthys, her thoughts seemed to have polluted mine. She . . . doesn't care for sea gods or their ilk. Again, I apologize."

Percy still looked a little confused, but less annoyed.

"Nephthys is a river goddess," Nico reminded him.

"Oh. Oh, right. Well that explains why you reminded me of a river nymph."

"What were you saying about Anubis?" asked Zia, not to be deterred from her original question.

"Nephthys is also Anubis's mother," said Nico, in case Percy had forgotten this too.

"I'm well aware of that," said Zia. "I just wondered what you were saying about him."

"Just . . . talking about Mythomagic," lied Nico weakly. "He and I play together sometimes."

Zia looked unconvinced. Her eyes moved to the Kanes, then to Percy. "May I have a word in private, Nico?" she asked once she turned back to him.

Nico glanced at the others nervously, then shrugged and followed Zia off the terrace. They crossed the Great Hall, which was still a wreck, then came to the hallway where everyones' rooms were, including Nico's.

"Um, here is fine, I think," said Nico. "There's no one around. We can't go into my room because they've got a rule about no guys and girls being alone in a room together." Plus Nico didn't want Zia seeing how his room was decorated. Sadie often called his room the room of death, and even Percy found the decorations a little morbid. No doubt Zia, with her misplaced maternal instincts, would be horrified to find him living in a room with so many death relics.

"Are you hosting Anubis?" asked Zia without any preamble.

Nico froze. Then he moved his mouth, probably quite similarly to a fish's He was trying to talk but the words wouldn't come.

Zia's expression grew alarmed by his reaction. "You are, aren't you?" she demanded. "How? It shouldn't be possible."

"I don't know," admitted Nico. Denying it seemed useless now. Zia knew and lying wouldn't convince her otherwise. "We didn't mean for it to happen. It just . . happened. It was more of an accident than anything else."

Zia stared at him so long that Nico started to feel uncomfortable.

"I . . . we think it might be because of our powers. He's a death god. I'm the son of a death god –"

"That shouldn't have made a difference. Thoth tried taking children of Athena as hosts in the past. Other gods tried to match up their powers with demigods they selected. It never worked, not once. Just trying should have killed you."

"I know," said Nico miserably. "Like I said, we don't know how it happened. It wasn't deliberate and we're trying to undo it, but we're kind of stuck together and can't figure out how. Just . . . just don't tell anyone. If anyone finds out, it could start a war, Zia. That's something none of us can afford. Well, maybe the Greek pantheon could afford it, but the Egyptian Pantheon is already against the ropes with Apophis rising and the House of Life being . . . well, being the House of Life."

"And no matter what happens, you'll be right in the middle of it," said Zia, looking at him with sad eyes.

"Yeah . . ."

"Well . . . now I understand why you're here . . . why you've thrown your lot in with the Kanes even though you don't have to –"

"What?" Nico blinked at her. "Of course I have to. Even if I wasn't possessed by Anubis, I can't sit by and do nothing when my friends need help . . . or when something's trying to destroy the world. I can't sit by when that's happening either."

Zia put one hand to her mouth, as though trying to cover a laugh, like she found Nico's priorities amusing.

"That's why Percy's here too," continued Nico, even though he guessed correctly that any mention of Percy would annoy Zia. "He's my cousin, and my best friend. The closest thing I have to a big brother. And he's the most heroic person I know. Stop scowling. He saved the world last summer, you know. If there's one person in the world I trust to save me, it's him."

Zia looked a bit upset by that comment. Almost like her feelings had been hurt, which was completely ridiculous. Nico had only known her about 12 hours. Why in Hades would he have so much faith in her to think that she could save him?

He fought back a sigh then forced himself to meet her eyes. "You probably know this on some level, but . . . what you're feeling isn't real."

"What?" Zia looked at him sharply.

"A side effect of hosting a god is that you start to take on some of their personality traits. Things that are important to them become important to you. Their habits start to become your habits. Sadie and Carter have both told me about the things that have happened to them since they hosted Isis and Horus. I can tell that some things about me have changed since I started hosting Anubis. And you . . . you're thinking of me the way Nephthys would think of Anubis."

"I . . ." Zia didn't seem to know what to say.

"If you acknowledge it, you can fight it. And you should fight it as much as you can. Because those feelings aren't really yours. And they're not really directed at me."

Zia continued to stare at him. Nico wanted to shrink away under her gaze. Instead he kept his eyes locked on hers and forced himself to keep up the front that he knew what he was talking about.

"You're right," said Zia finally. "And I apologize. I hadn't realized what was happening . . . not consciously. And I'm sorry to have troubled you."

"You didn't," said Nico quickly. Then he bit his tongue. He didn't want to say anything that could be taken as encouragement. "It's just that it would get troublesome eventually. Those feelings will end up driving us both crazy if you don't fight them down. But now that you know . . . yeah . . . So, I'm going to go back and . . . do stuff. I'm sure we'll see more of each other . . . yeah . . ." Without further ado, Nico walked awkwardly away.

_You __might __as __well __have __told__ her,__ '__Yeah,__ excuse __me __while __I __go __hide __from__ you,__'_ teased Anubis.

_Shut __up._

_ That __aside, __you __handled__ that __very __well,_ Anubis told him.

_I__ noticed__ you __were __cowering __in __the __far __corners __of __my __mind __during __that __conversation. __Thanks__ so __much __for __your __support._

_ That__ conversation __was __between __you __and __Zia,_ said Anubis defensively. _I __had __no __wish __to __interfere._

_You__'__re __useless, __you __know__ that?_

Anubis just laughed.

* * *

><p>Nico couldn't help but feel relieved when Zia left with Amos near sunset. He'd tried to avoid her the rest of the day and stuck near Percy. They'd spent the morning on sentry duty, then let the shabti army take over because Percy was bushed after fighting all night, and Ra's blessing seemed to have missed him, which Nico didn't think was fair for his cousin. While Percy slept off the effects of overusing his curse of Achilles, Nico helped out with some of the repairs. His magic had inexplicably improved, and he guessed that could only be attributed to Ra's return.<p>

Nico also tried to avoid Sadie, without being as obvious about it. He still hadn't gotten her a present yet, and even though he'd finally thought up a good gift for her, he wasn't able to go retrieve it.

He got his chance shortly after sunset, after Anubis and Bast fetched Sadie and Carter to go speak with the other gods and welcome Ra back.

"I'm heading to camp," Nico told Percy. "You want a lift?"

Percy shook his head. "I'm going to catch the subway back home. To my apartment. I have school tomorrow. I should have had school today, but . . ." he shrugged, a smirk on his face.

"I can give you a lift there, too," Nico told him "It's the least I can do."

"No, it's fine, I can –"

Nico grabbed onto his arm and shadow traveled them both the balcony of Percy's apartment.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Percy sounded a little upset as he grabbed Nico's arm, preparing to steady him. "Don't you dare overdo it, Nico! Not after everything –"

"I keep telling you, I feel perfectly fine," said Nico. "Ra's blessing was like a full restore. All my physical strength and endurance back, as well as all my capacity for using my demigod powers, and a refill for what little Egyptian magic I'd used, all at the same time."

"Even so, I don't want you using anymore nectar or ambrosia for a month," said Percy sternly. "Not after you lived off of it for two weeks."

Nico decided not to argue and just nodded. He'd already pointed out several times in similar arguments that the time compression turned that two weeks into about three days for him, but Percy wasn't listening. And Nico couldn't really fault him for it. He still felt bad about making Percy worry so much, and nearly dying in front of Percy, and all that. "No ambrosia or nectar for a month," he repeated after Percy. "I promise."

"And you be careful," said Percy, catching his eye. "If you need help, then you _ask_ me for it. I'll be there as soon as I can get there. You know I will."

"I know. And thanks for everything, Percy. I don't know what would have happened to me if you weren't around." Nico wrapped one arm around him awkwardly in a kind-of hug, then quickly released him and jumped back. "So thanks. I'll see you later."

He quickly shadow traveled away, thus avoiding any awkward chick-flick scenes, and breathed a sigh of relief when he was on the perimeters of Camp Half-Blood, alone.

He'd arrived just in time for campfire, which was good, not because he planned on attending, but because it meant he'd run into as few other people as possible.

Nico made a bee-line to Cabin Fifteen, the Hypnos Cabin. When he got there, he was pleased to see that once again, the three children of Hypnos had slept through dinner and missed campfire as well. He approached Clovis's bed, grabbed hold of the mattress, tilted it, and spilled the calf-like boy onto the floor to wake him up.

"Michael Jackson!" shouted Clovis as he was startled awake. "Wh-what? What?" He looked around bewildered. "Nico? What did you do that for?"

"I wanted to get your permission for something," said Nico. "Then you can go back to sleep."

Clovis blinked at him with sleep filled eyes, then climbed back into bed without actually ever standing back up. It was like watching a worm trying to climb up steps, but somehow Clovis managed. "Yes . . . yes . . . anything is fine. If we're finished, I'll just . . ."

"Certainly," said Nico as Clovis laid his head back down on his pillow. "So I'm just going to take a few drops of Lethe water from one of your tin bowls, since it's alright."

"Fine, fine," muttered Clovis. His eyes were already closed.

"Excellent."

Nico turned to the poplar branch that was dripping white liquid into tin bowls near the fireplace. That branch, he knew, had been dipped into Lethe, and was the symbol of Hypnos. The properties of the Lethe water changed just slightly after being affected by the lesser god's power. Nico moved to stand in front of the tin bowls and studied them carefully before removing a syringe and two small glass vials from his Duat storage locker.

_Be __very __careful,_ said Anubis in his mind.

_You __don__'__t __have __to __tell __me __that,_ said Nico. _Shouldn__'__t __you __be__ giving __Sadie __and __Carter__ and __your__ fellow__ gods __your __full __attention __right __now?_

_ I__ knew__ what __you __were __planning __to __do, __of __course. __I __thought __I__'__d __better __watch __in __and __make __sure __nothing __went __wrong,_ said Anubis.

_Then __stop __distracting __me._ Nico used the syringe to extract a few milliliters of Lethe water from one of the tin bowls then dropped three drops into each vial. When he was finished, he stored them all back in his locker and left the cabin.

Nico hadn't strictly needed permission to take the Lethe water. Stealing it would have been easy enough, and chances of getting caught were extremely low, but Nico figured he had taken enough risks recently. It was a very small thing to ask permission from someone who was too drowsy to even pay attention to what Nico was asking, and would rather just say yes to get him to leave than listen to what he was saying. No, Clovis wouldn't even remember. Sometimes forgetfulness could be a great blessing.

He hurried to the camp's borders then shadow traveled back to Brooklyn House. Jaz and Alyssa were playing checkers in the Great Hall, and Felix was playing with some penguins under their table.

"Are Sadie and Carter back yet?" he asked them.

"Yep. They've been back for a little while. Where have you been?" Jaz wanted to know.

"I stopped by Camp Half-Blood," he told them. The demigod camp and his demigod status had been officially explained to all the trainees earlier that day, during the first of several meetings that they used to break up the long hours of repairing the house. Thankfully, everyone seemed alright with that, mainly because few, if any of them had any House of Life ties, and hadn't been affected by any prejudices or misconceptions that the House of Life freaks had about demigods. Combine that with Percy's extremely badass performance throughout the night, and Nico's own not-too-shabby demonstrations of powers, and all the trainees were more than happy to have a couple demigods on their side. No one even seemed freaked out by the fact that Nico was the son of Hades . . . but then, they'd already known he had an affinity for necromancy, so they were probably a little prepared for that.

"Can I come next time?" asked Felix, poking his head out from under the table.

"Sorry, but that's not a good idea," said Nico.

"That mess with Hades almost declaring war?" asked Alyssa.

Nico nodded. That incident had also been relayed to all the trainees. In fact, about the only thing they hadn't been told was how Nico was inadvertently hosting Anubis. That was something that the fewer people who knew, the better. As far as everything else, well Nico felt good to have it all out in the open, finally.

"Most demigods see threats everywhere, because we're constantly being attacked by monsters, magicians, sorcerers, even other demigods sometimes. Camp Half-Blood is the one place where they don't have to be afraid, so they don't –"

"It's alright, Nico," said Jaz. "We get it."

Nico talked with them a few more minutes before heading up to Sadie's room. It was nice now that they finally knew everything. Before, he hadn't been an outcast at Brooklyn House by any means, but he hadn't exactly been part of the team either. He'd deliberately kept a bit of distance from the trainees because he hadn't been sure how they'd feel when they found out what he really was. Now he would have felt silly for ever feeling that way, except precedence had taught him that the magicians of Brooklyn House were the exception, not the rule. But he was damn glad that he'd found them.

He was in a good mood when he went up to Sadie's room, and raised his hand to knock on the door . . . then stopped as he heard someone talking inside. It was Sadie, he realized, and at first he thought she was talking to herself. Then he heard Carter take over and realized that they were recounting their escapades from the past few days, recording it on Sadie's cassette recorder, just like they had their first adventure about the Red Pyramid.

Nico leaned against the wall beside the door as he listened in, not quite eavesdropping since he knew they'd be distributing the tape anyway. He just didn't want to interrupt while they were on a roll. Especially since they were such good story tellers.

He was a little surprised by a few of the things he heard, especially the part where Sadie was recounting what happened in the graveyard in England.

_What? __You _kissed_ Sadie? __Anubis, __what __the __Hades?_

_ . . . Shut up._

And also a bit annoyed about other parts.

_Did __you __know__ she __went __questing __with __Walt?_

_ I was aware of it, but there was hardly anything I could do about it._

It stung a little bit that they completely left him out, glossing over any mention of him and Percy, but Nico knew why they did it. They were trying to keep attention away from him as much as they could, so that no one would discover his secret, that he was hosting Anubis.

Nico didn't realize how much time had passed that he just stood there, listening to their story, but suddenly they were nearing the end, and his internal clock told him that it was almost dawn. He'd spent all night just listening to them.  
>He didn't open the door until Sadie had clicked off the recorder. Both Kanes looked up startled, then looked at each other guiltily.<p>

"I guess you heard that," said Carter. "And we were going to tell you before we showed it to anyone –"

"You mean let anyone listen to it," corrected Sadie. "And Nico, we know how important you were to all of this, but –"

"I get it," said Nico quickly. "I'm not mad, so don't worry about it. I actually came to give you something . . . I know I'm a few days late, but I was stuck in the middle of the Duat during your birthday, and missed the week before it because of some stupid time-warp stuff, but . . ." Nico trailed off embarrassed and glanced at Carter out of the corner of his eye. He hadn't planned on giving Sadie her present in front of anyone. He'd wanted to do it when it was just the two of them, for some reason . . . but now he couldn't help but wonder at his own motives. Anubis had kissed Sadie. _Kissed_ her. Like what Percy did with Annabeth that made everyone shout at them to go get a room. Nico couldn't believe it and wasn't sure how he felt about that. Remembering how hosting a god could affect the host made that even more confusing for Nico, but for now he tried to shove those thoughts aside.

Besides, there wasn't anything wrong with Carter seeing him give this to Sadie. It actually concerned him too. So Nico reached into his Duat locker and pulled out the vials he'd procured.

"This is water from the River Lethe," he told Sadie, and held the vials out to her. "Well, not directly from Lethe. It's from a tree branch that Hypnos dipped in Lethe, that his kids have in their cabin, back at camp. The water's properties change a little because of his power, so it becomes more predictable what memories will be erased."

"What?" Sadie looked bewildered and made no move to take the vials. "I don't understand."

"Lethe is the river of forgetfulness from Greek mythology," supplied Carter. "The water washes away memories."

"Yeah, I know, I remember that much," said Sadie. "I wasn't asleep when Nico told us about his past, and why his memories are gone, you know. I just don't get why he wants me to have that."

"Your grandparents," said Nico. "They were possessed by those two enemy gods. The tried to kill you. They'll never be able to forget that . . . well, normally they'd never be able to forget that."

"You want me to wash away their memories?" Sadie's voice made it hard to tell what she thought of the idea.

"I want you to know that you have that option," said Nico. "I don't . . . I don't know a whole lot about families and how things work, so it probably seems weird me of all people giving you this . . . But I know sometimes bad things happen and they can ruin a family forever . . . and I have heard plenty of people wishing that there was some kind of reset button. So that's what I'm giving you. Each of these vials has three drops in it. These doses will take away the past five to ten days worth of memories, and no more. So . . . if your grandparents need more help than a doctor can give them . . . and you just want things to go back to the way they were before all that happened . . . you can use this water. If you think they're fine without it, then you don't have to use it. You can save it. It's something that can be used in a lot of ways, on allies or enemies, depending on the situation."

"Thank you," whispered Sadie as she accepted the vials and stored them safely in her Duat locker. Then she stared at Nico with an intense expression, like she was looking straight into his soul. Nico wasn't sure if she was upset with him or not. After hearing about what had happened to Bes . . . well he could see how this gift might make Sadie uncomfortable. And erasing peoples' memories was a touchy subject even at the best of times.

Then Sadie lunged forward. At first, Nico thought she was attacking him. Then her arms wrapped around him tightly in an almost violent embrace, and he realized she was hugging him. He returned the hug but much less violently. Sadie held on to him for a long time, pressing her face against his shoulder. Nico couldn't tell if she was crying or not, but didn't feel any sobs shaking her body. If there were tears coming from her eyes they wouldn't have leaked through his jacket, so that was no indicator.

"Are you okay?" he asked softly after nearly a full minute standing like that. He could feel Anubis lurking in his mind, trying to pretend he wasn't, and it was disconcerting but Nico let it pass.

"Yes," said Sadie. "I'm just so tired."

Nico looked helplessly toward Carter who shrugged, looking awkward. So Nico held Sadie for a few more minutes, until she finally pulled away.

"I'm glad you're our friend, Nico," said Sadie Maybe it was Nico's imagination, but it sounded like she put a lot of stress on the word 'friend.' "And I'm really glad you're okay. I was really worried about you when you and Anubis were in the Duat."

"We were both worried," said Carter. "But we're not going to get violent about it again, right Sadie?"

Sadie scowled at her brother.

"It's . . . um . . . almost breakfast time," Nico told them. "I haven't slept tonight, and I know you guys haven't either . . . so why don't we get something to eat before we crash?"

"Yeah," agreed Sadie. She turned her face away from Nico and her brother and sniffed rather loudly. "You owe me some McDonalds, Death Boy."

"And I always pay my debts," said Nico, relieved that the strange tension had passed, or so he thought. "Let's go."

"Let's," said Carter, looking relieved too. He led the way out of Sadie's room.

As soon as Carter's back was turned, Sadie grabbed Nico's arm to keep him from walking away too, and leaned in close to kiss him on the cheek.

"Thank you," she whispered, and kept her forehead pressed against the side of Nico's face for a moment, turning what could have been interpreted as just a friendly gesture into something at least a little deeper . . . but how much deeper, and whether or not that deepness was even directed at him, Nico couldn't even begin to guess.

"I – uh – welcome," stuttered Nico, his face burning like he'd gotten too close to an open fire.

_Stop__ stuttering, __Nico. __It__'__s __unbecoming._

_ Shut__ up! __This __is __your__ fault!_ Nico told the god. He wasn't sure what 'this' was, or if his feelings were even his own anymore. The only thing he was sure about was that his life had gotten infinitely more complicated, and that the Egyptian gods in general were to blame for projecting their personalities onto their hosts.

_Sorry,_ said Anubis. And he genuinely sounded sorry. _This__.__.__. __we__'__ll __figure __it __out._

_ Breakfast first._

"Nico? Are you coming?" asked Sadie. She stood in the doorway now, looking completely collected and cool, and very well put together even though she'd been awake for at least thirty-six hours now.

"Yes. Coming." Nico hastened to follow them.

"Are you alright?" asked Carter. "Your face is flushed."

"I'm fine, just fine," said Nico very quickly.

And despite everything, he was fine. Yeah, the world was still in peril, and he was confused, but everything that was important to him was safe for the time being, and he was among friends . . . friends who, somewhere along the line, had become his family. Together they would figure everything out.

"Actually, I'm better than fine. Now let's hurry to McDonalds!"

THE END

* * *

><p>AN: Thank you everyone for reading to the end! And yes, there will be sequels! Like I said last chapter, I'll be taking a break to concentrate on school work for a little while, but I do have more fics in this series planned.<p>

What did you think of Nico's gift to Sadie? Surprised? Disgusted? Think he should have gone with the Duat rock instead? Well, I'm sure Sadie will find _some_ use for the Lethe water. It seems like really useful stuff, lol.

If you've sent me a PM and I haven't responded yet, I promise to do that soon. I'm a little behind b.c of other stuff I have to do, but I do respond to all messages I receive. And I read all reviews too, so please let me know what you think!

(btw, MoonSurfer3343, eventually it is going to be discovered by everyone that Nico is hosting Anubis. I haven't decided quite when yet, but I'm building up to it. And when it happens, neither Hades nor Set is going to be happy)


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